Orientia tsutsugamushi infection causes scrub typhus, a common zoonosis of rural Asia. Orientia tsutsugamushi was recently detected by a real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) assay in animal specimens. We evaluated the same qPCR assay in specimens obtained from patients with serologically proven scrub typhus infections. The 47-kDa qPCR assay was more sensitive than was mouse i...

The Amflora (EH92-527-1) potato is a genetically modified (GM) potato in which only starch of the amylopectin form is produced. This has been achieved by intervening with the biosynthesis of starch in this variety of potato. The Amflora potato is solely grown for the purposes of enhancing its industrial application. Although the Amflora potato is not fit for human consumption, the presence of t...

The definitive diagnosis ability of IgM ELISA, nested RT-PCR and real-time quantitative PCR (qPCR) was evaluated for Chikungunya diagnosis using 180 clinical samples. Real-time qPCR showed a higher sensitivity (88.3%) for Chikungunya diagnosis in the early stages of infection, while IgM ELISA proved sensitive for the late stages of illness (81.8%). The results suggest that the application of bo...

A novel real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method using an attached universal template (UT) probe is described. The UT is an approximately 20 base attachment to the 5' end of a PCR primer, and it can hybridize with a complementary TaqMan probe. One of the advantages of this method is that different target DNA sequences can be detected employing the same UT probe, which subst...

INTRODUCTION Cart horses are a re-emerging population employed to carry recyclable material in cities. METHODS Sixty-two horses were sampled in an endemic area of human leptospirosis. The microscopic agglutination test (MAT) and real-time polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) were performed. RESULTS A seropositivity of 75.8% with serovar Icterohaemorrhagiae in 80.8% of the horses was observed. B...

This paper describes a short-amplicon-based TaqMan probe quantitative real-time PCR (qPCR) assay for the quantitative detection of canine meat in chicken nuggets, which are very popular across the world, including Malaysia. The assay targeted a 100-bp fragment of canine cytb gene using a canine-specific primer and TaqMan probe. Specificity against 10 different animals and plants species demonst...

PURPOSE To identify the frequency of polymorphism in the IL-10 gene, rs1800896 (-1082 A/G), in women with preeclampsia (PE) and in women in a control group and to associate the presence of this polymorphism with protection against the development of PE. METHODS This was a case-control study conducted on 54 women with PE, classified according to the criteria of the National High Blood Pressure...

INTRODUCTION This paper describes the epidemiology and control of a community outbreak of novel influenza A (H1N1-2009) originating from a dance club in Singapore between June and July 2009. MATERIALS AND METHODS Cases of novel influenza A (H1N1-2009) were confirmed using in-house probe-based real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Contact tracing teams from the Singapore Ministry of Healt...

On-site detection by flow-through polymerase chain reaction (PCR) microfluidic systems for rapid and highly sensitive analysis, are significantly desired for bioanalytical and medical research. The conventional continuous-flow PCR chips realized rapid detection, but their sensitivity was very low (10(6) to 10(8) copies μL(-1)). We improved this drawback by coating the chip with a PCR reagents m...