Abstract
Until recently, clinical microbiology involved three main approaches: (i) microscopy; (ii) culture and characterization of the pathogen; (iii) assay for specific antibodies. For many purposes these methods are still adequate. However, where they are slow, insensitive or otherwise suboptimal, DNA technology may provide an alternative (or supplementary) approach (see Table 1.1); in this approach, pathogens are detected and/or characterized by demonstrating the unique sequences of nucleotides in their nucleic acids (DNA or RNA).
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Singleton, P. (2000). DNA-Based Technology: An Introduction. In: DNA Methods in Clinical Microbiology. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-1286-6_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-1286-6_1
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
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