Farhad Safarpoor Dehkordi - Department of Food Hygiene, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran.
Sahar Hosseini - Young Researchers and Elites Club, Shahrekord Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shahrekord, Iran.
Ebrahim Rahimi - Food Hygiene, Colege of Veterinary Medicine, Islamic Azad University, Shahrekord Branch, Shahrekord, Iran.
Manouchehr Momeni - Young Researchers and Elites Club, Shahrekord Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shahrekord, Iran.

Background and Aim: Annually, many reports of occurrence of food poisoning due to the consumption of sea foods contaminated with Vibrio species have been published. The present study was carried out to study the prevalence rate of Vibrio parahaemolyticus and V. cholera and evaluation of presence of virulence genes of V. parahaemolyticus in sea-food products caught from Persian Gulf. Materials and Methods: In total, 200 samples of fish, lobster and crab caught from Persian Gulf collected in the summer of 2013 and were transferred to the food quality control laboratory of the Islamic Azad University of Shahrekord. Samples were cultured and the positive specimens were evaluated for presence of bacterial species and virulence genes using Polymerase Chain Reaction. Results: In total, 34.5% of samples were contaminated with Vibrio species. Frequency of V. cholera and V. parahaemolyticus were 5% and 21%, respectively. 8.5 percent of samples were contaminated with other species of Vibrio. From a total of 42 positive samples of V. parahaemolyticus, frequency of tdh, tlh and trh virulence genes were 45.93%, 40.47% and 16.46%, respectively. Conclusions: The sea-food products of Persian Gulf were infected with V. parahaemolyticus and V. cholera. Fish samples had the highest prevalence of V. parahaemolyticus and V. cholera. It seems that, places of fishing and processing and the moods of transportation and distribution of fish, lobster and crab don’t have suitable hygiene in Iran.

Vibrio parahaemolyticus, Vibrio cholerae, Virulence genes, Sea-food products