Monday 17 August 2020

Bacterial Identification Techniques

Accurate and definitive bacterial identification is essential for correct disease diagnosis, treatment of infection, and trace-back of disease outbreaks associated with microbial infections. Bacterial identification is used in a wide variety of applications including microbial forensics, criminal investigations, bio-terrorism threats, and environmental studies.

Techniques include:

  • Conventional methods – Biochemical tests
  • Antibody-based methods
  • Nucleic acid-based methods – PCR, Southern blot, nucleic acid hybridization, RFLP, DNA fingerprinting
  • Automated microbial identification methods
  • DNA barcoding 
  • Other methods – Phage typing, Flow cytometry, SDS

Bacterial Identification by Biochemical tests

Primary test

  • Morphology
  • Gram’s staining/Acid fastness
  • Spores
  • Motility
  • The ability to grow in the air
  • Ability to grow in the anaerobic conditions
  • Catalase test
  • Oxidase test
  • Oxidation –Fermentation test

Secondary Tests

  • Acetylmethylcarbinol production (VP) test
  • Bile solubility test
  • CAMP test
  • Carbohydrate breakdown test
  • Carbon sources test
  • Chitinolytic test, Coagulase test
  • Decarboxylase test
  • Denitrification test
  • Deoxyribonuclease test
  • Gelatin hydrolysis test
  • Haemolysin production test
  • Hippurate hydrlysis test
  • Hydrogen sulfide production test
  • Indole test, Malonate test
  • Methyl red (MR) test, O/129 sensitivity test
  • ONPG test, Urease activity test
  • Tween 20/80 hydrolysis test

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