Rapid Detection of Rifampin-resistant Clinical Isolates of Mycobacterium tuberculosis by Reverse Dot Blot Hybridization

Objective A PCR-reverse dot blot hybridization （RDBH） assay was developed for rapid detection of rpoB gene mutations in ＇hot mutation region＇ of Mycobacterium tuberculosis （M. tuberculosis）. Methods 12 oligonucleotide probes based on the wild-type and mutant genotype rpoB sequences of M. tuberculosis were designed to screen the most frequent wild-type and mutant genotypes for diagnosing RIF resistance. 300 M. tuberculosis clinical isolates were detected by RDBH, conventional drug-susceptibility testing （DST） and DNA sequencing to evaluate the RDBH assay. Results The sensitivity and specificity of the RDBH assay were 91.2% （165/181） and 98.3% （117/119）, respectively, as compared to DST. When compared with DNA sequencing, the accuracy, positive predictive value （PPV） and negative predictive value （NPV） of the RDBH assay were 97.7% （293/300）, 98.2% （164/167）, and 97.0% （129/133）, respectively. Furthermore, the results indicated that the most common mutations were in codons 531 （48.6%）, 526 （25.4%）, 516 （8.8%）, and 511 （6.6%）, and the combinative mutation rate was 15 （8.3%）. One and two strains of insertion and deletion were found among all strains, respectively. Conclusion Our findings demonstrate that the RDBH assay is a rapid, simple and sensitive method for diagnosing RIF-resistant tuberculosis.

Accuracy of a reverse dot blot hybridization assay for simultaneous detection of the resistance of four anti-tuberculosis drugs in Mycobacterium tuberculosis isolated from China

Background:Drug resistant tuberculosis poses a great challenge for tuberculosis control worldwide.Timely determination of drug resistance and effective individual treatment are essential for blocking the transmission of drug resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis.We aimed to establish and evaluate the accuracy of a reverse dot blot hybridization(RDBH)assay to simultaneously detect the resistance of four anti-tuberculosis drugs in M tuberculosis isolated in China.Methods:In this study,we applied a RDBH assay to simultaneously detect the resistance of rifampicin(RIF),isoniazid(INH),streptomycin(SM)and ethambutol(EMB)in 320 clinical M.tuberculosis isolates and compared the results to that from phenotypic drug susceptibility testing(DST) and sequencing.The RDBH assay was designed to test up to 42 samples at a time.Pearson's chi-square test was used to compute the statistical measures of the RDBH assay using the phenotypic DST or sequencing as the gold standard method,and Kappa identity test was used to determine the consistency between the RDBH assay and the phenotypic DST or sequencing.Results:The results showed that the concordances between phenotypic DST and RDBH assay were 95%for RIF,92.8%for INH,84.7%for SM,77.2%for EMB and the concordances between sequencing and RDBH assay were 97.8%for RIF,98.8%for INH,99.1%for SM,93.4%for EMB.Compared to the phenotypic DST results,the sensitivity and specificity of the RDBH assay for resistance detection were 92.4 and 98.5%for RIF,90.3 and 97.3%for INH,77.4 and 91.5%for SM,61.4 and 85.7%for EMB,respeaively;compared to sequencing,the sensitivity and specificity of the RDBH assay were 97.7 and 97.9%for RIF,97.9 and 100.0% for INH,97.8 and 1OO.O% for SM,82.6 and 99.1%for EMB,respectively.The turnaround time of the RDBH assay was 7 h for testing 42 samples.Conclusions:Our data suggested that the RDBH assay could serve as a rapid and efficient method for testing the resistance of M. tuberculosis against RIF,INH,SM and EMB,enabling early administration of appropriate treatment regimens to the affected drug resistant tuberculosis patients.

Mutations in pre-core and basic core promoter regions of hepatitis B virus in chronic hepatitis B patients

AIM: To investigate the frequency of mutations in pre-core (pre-C) and basic core promoter (BCP) regions of hepatitis B virus (HBV) from Shanxi Province, and the association between mutations and disease related indexes.METHODS: One hundred chronic hepatitis B patients treated at Shanxi Province Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine were included in this study. PCR-reverse dot blot hybridization and mismatch amplification mutation assay (MAMA)-PCR were used to detect the mutations in the HBV pre-C and BCP regions. HBV DNA content and liver function were compared between patients with mutant HBV pre-C and BCP loci and those with wild-type loci. The consistency between PCR-reverse dot blot hybridization and MAMA-PCR for detecting mutations in the HBV pre-C and BCP regions was assessed.RESULTS: Of the 100 serum samples detected, 9.38% had single mutations in the pre-C region, 29.17% had single mutations in the BCP region, 41.67% had mutations in both BCP and pre-C regions, and 19.79% had wild-type loci. The rates of BCP and pre-C mutations were 65.7% and 34.3%, respectively, in hepatitis B e antigen (HBeAg) positive patients, and 84.6% and 96.2%, respectively, in HBeAg negative patients. The rate of pre-C mutations was significantly higher in HBeAg negative patients than in HBeAg positive patients (χ2 = 26.62, P = 0.00), but there was no significant difference in the distribution of mutations in the BCP region between HBeAg positive and negative patients (χ2 = 2.43, P = 0.12). The presence of mutations in the pre-C (Wilcoxon W = 1802.5, P = 0.00) and BCP regions (Wilcoxon W = 2906.5, P = 0.00) was more common in patients with low HBV DNA content. Both AST and GGT were significantly higher in patients with mutant pre-C and BCP loci than in those with wild-type loci (P < 0.05). PCR-reverse dot blot hybridization and MAMA-PCR for detection of mutations in the BCP and pre-C regions had good consistency, and the Kappa values obtained were 0.91 and 0.58, respectively.CONCLUSION: HBeAg negative patients tend to have HBV pre-C mutations. However, these mutations do not cause increased DNA copies, but associate with damage of liver function.

Screening of Species-specific DNA Probes for Identification of Fallopia multiflora

To screen species-specific DNA probes for identification of Fallopia muhiflora, the genomic DNA （gDNA） suppression subtraction hybridization （SSH） between F. muhiflora and F. muhiflora var. ciliinervis was firstly performed. The obtained differential gDNA fragments by SSH were then hybridized with gDNA ar- rays consisting of multiple whole genomes of several species （adulterants and/or closely related species of F. muhiflora） and four differential fragments were screened uniquely representing F. muhiflora, which could be used as F. muhiflora species-specific probes. The screened DNA probes were tested by reverse dot blot hybridization and the results demonstrated that these probes could be used reliably to identify F, muhiflora. The species-specific DNA probes obtained in this study exhibited broad application prospects in the preparation of gene chips for identifying Chinese traditional medicines and the authentication of germplasm re- sources and crude drugs of F. muhiflora.