Detection of TT virus in human hair and skin

Abstract

The novel virus, TT virus (TTV), has been considered as a possible cause of cryptogenic liver disease, yet evidence of TTV prevalence in the general population continues to increase. To further investigate the prevalence of TTV, hair follicle and epidermal skin samples of healthy individuals were examined for the presence of TTV DNA. TTV DNA was observed in two out of 11 hair samples and four out of 11 skin samples. TTV DNA was also detected in 47% (17/36) of serum specimens from healthy individuals. All DNA positive specimens were identified by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) with a single primer set specific for the 5′-end region of the TTV genome. Amplicons from hair, skin and serum samples were sequenced and the percentage of divergence estimated by sequence alignment. The divergence of sequences present in different samples from the same individual (ranging from 81.76% to 93.71%) suggests that multiple strains of TTV may be present in each infected individual, with different tissues containing distinctive strains. Thus, TTV may subclinically infect various tissues of the body. These results suggest that TTV may be highly prevalent in the general population and thus may not be an epidemiologically important virus.