Simultaneous detection and identification of viral pathogens from human, animal, plant and invertebrate hosts using DNA arrays.

Detection of viral pathogens is of critical importance in several domains, including biology, medicine, agriculture, aquaculture, and food processing. Historically, common methods for virus detection have relied upon isolation and in vitro culture, or immunological assays, or, more recently, on nucleic acid based detection assays. One limitation of most detection procedures, however, is that only a single or few targets of interest can be detected and identified in a single assay, hampering efficient routine detection of viruses. The aim of this research is to develop a generic viral detection platform for the simultaneous detection of multiple viruses based on both a sequence specific (multiplex PCR) and sequence non-specific amplification method (random primed amplification) combined with DNA array hybridization. This should enable accurate detection of target viruses (differential diagnosis) or screening for target and related (possibly unknown) viruses, respectively. Both approaches will be evaluated and compared for their use in practice focusing on numerous viruses (proof-of-concept) from different hosts.

Keywords:DNA array, multiplex, diagnosis, detection, identification, validation

Disciplines:Diagnostics, Laboratory medicine, Medicinal products, Microbiology, Systems biology