New approaches in sub-species level Salmonella classification
Burkhard Malorny, Elisabeth Hauser and Ralf Dieckmann
from: Salmonella: From Genome to Function (Edited by: Steffen Porwollik). Caister Academic Press, U.K. (2011)
Abstract
Salmonellae form a complex group of bacteria consisting of two species, 6 subspecies and more than 2,500 serovars (serotypes). Salmonella identification below species level is most often limited to phenotypic typing methods such as biochemical and serological identification, which are costly, time-consuming and do not always reflect the evolution of Salmonella groups. Newer methods for Salmonella typing and subtyping include genome-based methods such as pulsed field gel electrophoresis (PFGE), Multiple Loci VNTR Analysis (MLVA), Multilocus sequence typing (MLST) and (multiplex-) PCR-based methods. In the last years further molecular typing technologies were evaluated for this purpose. This chapter discusses some of these emerging technologies and gives an outlook on future developments with a focus on oligonucleotide microarrays, spectroscopic methods such as MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry and special developments such as bead-based suspension arrays using Luminex technology and DNA sequence-based approaches. We review these new techniques, which promise significant advantages compared to traditional culture-based methods with respect to speed, ease of use, reliability and automation and discuss their advantages and disadvantages read more ...
