Novel tech targets foodborne pathogen detection

The authors said rapid and accurate detection of food pathogenic microorganisms are key technologies to timely control and prevent pathogenic food poisoning.

Xing et al successfully developed some foodborne pathogenic microorganism detection methods with prominent features based on the platforms of electrochemiluminescence (ECL) and microfluidic.

The ECL detection system is a representative work, to realize rapid, specific, yet highly sensitive foodborne pathogen genomes.    

How it works​

The idea of the system is integrating the in situ nucleic acids amplification using nano-magnetic primers and in situ ECL readout on magnetic beads based detection platform.

They used Listeria monocytogenes as the target to examine the proposed technology, reaching a detection limit of fg/μL genome in one hour.

The novel method has provided the evidence as a proof-of-concept, so it has potential for development of automatic mode for detection of the real samples.

Due to rapid development of molecular biology techniques, especially the emerging biological detection method based on the recognition of characteristic genes, vitality has been injected in the development of high sensitive and specific detection methods of foodborne pathogens.

Comparable methods​

Compared with the antigen-antibody based detection method, these methods have the advantages of specificity, high sensitivity and wide range of application.

In food contamination, some common and highly pathogenic pathogens include Listeria monocytogenes, Vibrio parahaemolyticus, Norwalk and Rotavirus.

In hot and humid southern China, the problems caused by these foodborne pathogenic microorganism epidemics are particularly prominent, said the researchers.

The paper was written by Dr Xiao Zhu, and with professor Da Xing, from the Institute of Laser Life Science, South China Normal University as the corresponding author.

It summarized the latest progresses of rapidly detecting foodborne pathogenic microorganisms based on the recognition of characteristic genes.

Source: Chinese Science Bulletin

Online ahead of print, DOI: 10.1360/972012-1094

“Recent progress in gene-sensing techniques for rapid detection of foodborne pathogens” (in Chinese)​

Authors: Zhu X, Huang R, Xing D