RESEARCH ARTICLE
Discrimination of Enterobacteriaceae and Non-fermenting Gram Negative Bacilli by MALDI-TOF Mass Spectrometry
Reiner Schaumann1, †, Nicolas Knoop1, †, *, Gelimer H Genzel1, Kevin Losensky1, Christiane Rosenkranz1, Catalina S Stîngu1, Wolfgang Schellenberger2, Arne C Rodloff1, Klaus Eschrich2
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2013Volume: 7
First Page: 118
Last Page: 122
Publisher ID: TOMICROJ-7-118
DOI: 10.2174/1874285801307010118
Article History:
Received Date: 18/2/2013Revision Received Date: 7/4/2013
Acceptance Date: 17/4/2013
Electronic publication date: 28/06/2013
Collection year: 2013

open-access license: This is an open access article licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/-licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted, non-commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the work is properly cited.
Abstract
Discrimination of Enterobacteriaceae and Non-fermenting Gram Negative Bacilli by MALDI-TOF Mass Spectrometry
Matrix assisted laser desorption/ionization time of flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS) has proven to be an effective identification tool in medical microbiology. Discrimination to subspecies or serovar level has been found to be challenging using commercially available identification software. By forming our own reference database and using alternative analysis methods, we could reliably identify all implemented Enterobacteriaceae and non-fermenting gram negative bacilli by MALDI-TOF MS and even succeeded to distinguish Shigella sonnei from Escherichia coli (E. coli) and Salmonella enterica spp. enterica serovar Enteritidis from Salmonella enterica spp. enterica serovar Typhimurium. Furthermore, the method showed the ability to separate Enterohemorrhagic E. coli (EHEC) and Enteropathogenic E. coli (EPEC) from non-enteropathogenic E. coli.