Giardia duodenalis: Biology and Pathogenesis

Abstract

Giardia duodenalis captured the attention of Leeuwenhoek in 1681 while he was examining his own diarrheal stool, but, ironically, it did not really gain attention as a human pathogen until the 1960s, when outbreaks were reported. Key technological advances, including in vitro cultivation, genomic and proteomic databases, and advances in microscopic and molecular approaches, have led to understand that this is a eukaryotic organism with a reduced genome rather than a truly premitochondriate eukaryote.