Rapid Differentiation of BCG Vaccine from M.smegmatis by Genomic Amplification

CHENG-PING KUAN* AND CHIA-PO LIN

 National Laboratories of Foods and Drugs, Department of Health, Executive Yuan 161-2, Kuen Yang Street, Nankang 115, Taipei, Taiwan, R.O.C. 

ABSTRACT

   Amplification of the region of 16S-23S rRNA spacer was performed on 9 isolates of Mycobacterium bovis BCG (including Brazilian, Connaught, Danish, Glaxo, Japanese, Pasteur, Russian, Taiwan and Tice) and one isolate of Mycobacterium smegmatis using BCGF1 and BCGR1 as the primer pair. In this study we found 350-bp of PCR product in all the BCG strains but a 456-bp amplified fragment from M.smegmatis. Consequently, this primer pair may be a potential tool in differentiating between these two Mycobacterium species.

Key words: Mycobacterium bovis BCG, M.smegmatis, vaccine, polymerase chain reaction