Rapid test to detect E.Coli bacteria

Related tags E. coli Escherichia coli

Researchers at the Cornell University's Department of Food Science
and Technology have developed a sensor, which employs liposomes, to
rapidly detect E. coli bacteria, the Institute of Food
Technologists reports this week.

Researchers at the Cornell University's Department of Food Science and Technology have developed a sensor, which employs liposomes, to rapidly detect E. coli bacteria, the Institute of Food Technologists reports this week.

Field tests of the new sensor at Cornell have rapidly detected traces of Escherechia coli and other food-borne pathogens.

Richard A. Durst, professor of chemistry at Cornell's​ Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, NY, described the new sensor in a talk, "Biosensor for the Rapid Detection of E. coli O157:H7,"​ at PITTCON 2002, an analytical technology conference in New Orleans on 17 March.

He explained how the liposome sensor has been able to detect the presence of pathogens, such as E. coli , cryptosporidium and listeria, in just eight minutes. According to Durst, the new sensor provides very sensitive detection of E. coli in a one format design, similar to a visible home-pregnancy test.

The basis for the rapid testing for the presence of E. coli is the liposome, a microscopic cell-like structure made in the laboratory by adding an aqueous, marker-containing solution to a phospholipid mixture.

Liposomes can contain dyes, fluorescent and visible, or other detectable compounds. On the outside of these structures' membranes, the Cornell researchers have affixed antibodies. When a pathogen, such as E.coli is detected, it binds to the antibodies and the liposome membrane is ruptured, releasing the dye or other marker.

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