Identifying a bacterium of the Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex comprises amplifying a nucleic acid fragment from one of 16 intergenic zones in the genome of the bacterium

摘要

Identifying a bacterium of the Mycobacterium tuberculosiscomplex comprises performing PCR on a nucleic acid sample using one of 16 pairs of primers to amplify a nucleic acid fragment from one of 16 intergenic zones (MST1 to MST16) in the genome of the bacterium, sequencing the amplified fragment and comparing the sequence with a data bank of such sequences for different species, subspecies, subtypes or genotypes. Independent claims are also included for: (1) isolated nucleic acid fragment amplified as above; (2) oligonucleotide capable of acting as a primer as above.