COMPARISON OF PRIMER SETS FOR STANDARDIZED DETECTION OF HUMANCALICIVIRUSES IN WATER

摘要

Norwalk-Like viruses (NLVs; human caliciviruses) are important causative agents of waterbornegastrointestinal illness. NLVs are not culturable at this time, except in humans. NLVs are on theUS EPA Contaminant Candidate List and are viral pathogens of concern in drinking water. Themost sensitive and specific methods for detection of NLVs are nucleic acid (NA) amplificationand characterization. However, a standardized NA method does not exist. To date, at least 10primer sets, mostly targeting the polymerase region, have been described for broad amplificationand detection of NLVs, but no single set of primers consistently detects all NLV strains.Furthermore, many of these primers have not been evaluated for detection in environmentalsamples or at low copy numbers of viral genomes. A sensitive, standardized approach needs tobe developed for detection of NLVs in environmental samples. We have developed a frameworkfor comparative evaluation of published, third generation primer sets for NA amplifation of NLV