RESEARCH ARTICLE
Evaluation of a Probe-Based PCR-ELISA System for Simultaneous Semi Quantitative Detection and Genotyping of Human Cytomegalovirus (HCMV) Infection in Clinical Specimens
Majid Talkhabifard1, Naeme Javid2, Abdolvahab Moradi2, Amir Ghaemi2, Alijan Tabarraei3, *
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2017Volume: 11
First Page: 83
Last Page: 91
Publisher ID: TOMICROJ-11-83
DOI: 10.2174/1874285801711010083
Article History:
Received Date: 10/12/2016Revision Received Date: 12/03/2017
Acceptance Date: 19/03/2017
Electronic publication date: 31/05/2017
Collection year: 2017

open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Background:
Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) is a common opportunistic pathogen that causes serious complications in immunosuppressed patients and infected newborns. In this study, PCR-ELISA was optimized for semi-quantitative detection of infection in clinical specimens and simultaneous genotyping of glycoprotein B for 4 major genotypes, due to its significance.
Method:
During DIG-labeling PCR, a pair of primers amplifies a fragment of variable region of the glycoprotein B encoding sequence. Under optimized conditions, labeled Target amplicons hybridize to biotinated specific probes and are detected in an ELISA system.
Results:
PCR-ELISA system showed specific performance with detection limit of approximately 100 copies of CMV DNA. The linear correlation was observed between the PCR-ELISA results (OD) and logarithmic scale of CMV (r=0.979). Repeatability of PCR-ELISA detection system for intra-assay and inter-assay was evaluated for negative and positive samples. In optimized conditions of hybridization, differentiation between genotypes of glycoprotein B was feasible using genotype-specific probes in PCR-ELISA genotyping system.
In comparison with sequencing method, genotyping system was confirmed with kappa index of 1.
Conclusion:
PCR-ELISA is proposed as an applicable and reliable technique for semi-quantitative diagnosis and typing of the infection. This technique is flexible to apply in a variety of molecular fields.