Interaction of Trypanosoma rangeli Tejera, 1920 with different cell lines in vitro

Intracellular multiplication of Trypanosoma rangeli was evaluated in vitro using experimental infection of Vero cells, murine macrophages, and promono cytes with T. rangeli Choachi, Macias, and SC-58 clone B1 strains. Our resu lts revealed a low infectivity of all T. rangeli strains to these cell line s. Macrophages showed the highest infection rate; however, intracellular fo rms were no longer observed 48 h post infection Despite the observation of intracellular parasites up to 144 h post infection, the infection rates of Vero cells and J774G.8 promonocytes with these parasite strains were always below 5%. Pre-incubation of parasites with normal mouse serum increased th e initial infectivity but not the time course of the infection. Under our e xperimental conditions, we did not observe any evidence of intracellular mu ltiplication of T. rangeli within these cell lines.