Detection limits of Legionella pneumophila in environmental samples after co-culture with Acanthamoeba polyphaga

BMC Microbiology

Research Article

Simona Casati¹  Lisa Conza¹  Valeria Gaia¹ 

[1]Swiss National Reference Centre for Legionella, Cantonal Institute of Microbiology, Via Mirasole 22a, 6500, Bellinzona, Switzerland

关键词: Legionella;    Culture;    Co-culture;    Compost;    Air;    Bioaerosol;    Detection limit;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1471-2180-13-49

 received in 2012-11-21, accepted in 2013-02-08,  发布年份 2013

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundThe efficiency of recovery and the detection limit of Legionella after co-culture with Acanthamoeba polyphaga are not known and so far no investigations have been carried out to determine the efficiency of the recovery of Legionella spp. by co-culture and compare it with that of conventional culturing methods. This study aimed to assess the detection limits of co-culture compared to culture for Legionella pneumophila in compost and air samples. Compost and air samples were spiked with known concentrations of L. pneumophila. Direct culturing and co-culture with amoebae were used in parallel to isolate L. pneumophila and recovery standard curves for both methods were produced for each sample.ResultsThe co-culture proved to be more sensitive than the reference method, detecting 102-103 L. pneumophila cells in 1 g of spiked compost or 1 m3 of spiked air, as compared to 105-106 cells in 1 g of spiked compost and 1 m3 of spiked air.ConclusionsCo-culture with amoebae is a useful, sensitive and reliable technique to enrich L. pneumophila in environmental samples that contain only low amounts of bacterial cells.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© Conza et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2013