微生物学技术

Hammerhead ribozymes are short catalytic RNA molecules possessing endoribonuclease activity. The enzyme’s specificity is mediated by variable flanking sequences complementary to the RNA target substrate (1,2). Cleavage occurs via transesterification 3′ to a nucleotide tr ...

Influenza A virus infection causes acute respiratory disease in humans and in various animal species, notably pigs, horses, seals, as well as chicken and water fowl. In this study, we present evidence that the multiplication of the RNA virus Influenza A can be inhibited by intracellular express ...

Bovine leukemia virus (BLV) is a retrovirus structurally related to human T-cell leukemia virus-I and -II and simian T-cell leukemia virus. It infects principally B-lymphocytes (1), causing a persistent expansion of B-cells, termed persistent lymphocytosis, in approx 30% of infected ca ...

Lyssavirus infection, better known as rabies, in animals or in humans, is characterized by a clinical picture of viral encephalitis. According to the WHO estimations, it is responsible for more than 50,000 human deaths each year. The diagnosis of lyssavirus infection in animals, which may be res ...

Measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) virus infections are common during childhood throughout the world. Measles and mumps viruses belong to the Paramyxoviridae family with an RNA genome of negative polarity and a simrlar overall viral structure at the molecular level (1,2). Rubella virus is a me ...

Parvovirus B 19 was discovered at the Virus Reference Laboratory in 1975 by Cossart and colleagues (1). First found in healthy blood donors, parvovirus B19 infection usually manifests as erythema infectiosum (fifth disease) in children. In adults the infection can cause acute arthritis. T ...

Both epidemiological and experimental evidence suggests sexual activity contributes to the etiology of cervical cancer. Searches for a responsible agent have pointed to an association with human papillomavirus (HPV). These viruses are nonenveloped, approx 55 nm in diameter, con ...

Human enteroviruses include polioviruses, coxsackieviruses, echoviruses, and newer enteroviruses designated enteroviruses 68–71. They are classified as one genus of the Picornaviridae; rhinoviruses are a separate genus of the same virus family. All picornaviruses are sma ...

Infants and young children undergoing their primary infection with common human respiratory viruses are at risk of serious, even life-threatening, lower respiratory tract infection, A multiplicity of viruses infect the human respiratory tract but a relatively small number are res ...

Poxviruses are large, double-stranded DNA viruses that replicate in the cytoplasm of infected cells. The family Poxviridae is divided into two subfamilies, the Entomopoxvirinae of insects and the Chordopoxvirinae of vertebrates; the latter consists of eight genera and several unc ...

Rotavirus has been recognized as the major etiological agent of acute gastroenteritis in infants and young children. The rotaviruses contain a genome of 11 segments of double-stranded RNA that can be separated into distinct bands by electrophoresis. The migration pattern of the 11 genome ...

The principle of time-resolved fluorometry and its application to solidphase immunoassays (TR-FIAs) was invented in the 1980s in Turku, Finland at the Wallac Biochemical Laboratory and University of Turku (1,2). One of the early diagnostic applications was the detection of viral antig ...

Sandfly fever Sicilian (SFS) virus (genus Phlebovirus, family Bunyaviridae) is a member of the sandfly fever virus serogroup, which also includes sandfly fever Naples and Toscana viruses. These viruses are transmitted by Phlebotomus sandflies in the Mediterranean and the Middle Eas ...

In 1953, the first adenovirus was isolated from a human and, subsequently, 47 types have been shown to exist. Adenoviruses are now classified into six subgroups (A–F), which are based on their hemagglutination properties (1). They have a icosahedron structure that contains double-stranded l ...

Sensitive immunoassays were developed in the 1950s and 1960s using radioactive isotopes. The application of enzymes as labels (1,2) in the late 1960s increased the potential sensitivity and safety of immunoassays. The widespread popularity of enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays ...

The improvements in DNA-sequencing technology in recent years has opened new possibilities, from large scale genome projects to routine diagnostic applications. Among the most important developments towards automated systems has been the introduction of the polymerase chain ...

The environment furnishes a variety of surroundings that may favor the survival of microorganisms. The aquatic environment (which includes marine and fresh water, raw and treated sewage, sludge, and sediments) often provides conditions in which pathogenic viruses released from the ...

In general, three assay types are commonly used in diagnostic virology. Since these are described in other chapters it suffices here just to reiterate the methodology names: 1.

Traditionally, the accurate detection of viruses and the diagnosis of viral diseases has been difficult and expensive as viruses cannot be visualized by conventional light microscopy and need propagation in primary or continuous cell culture. The advent and increasing sophistica ...

During the past 30 years, several strategies have been used to synthesize DNA. Moreover, it was not possible to utilize automated DNA synthesis until the phosphate triester method using phosphoramidite reagents was introduced (1,2). Since then, chemically synthesized oligonucleo ...