Parco Tecnologico Padano, Lodi, Italy,
Genes Nutr. 2009 Mar;4(1):1-12. doi: 10.1007/s12263-008-0106-1. Epub 2008 Dec 7.
Molecular methods allow the detection of pathogen nucleic acids (DNA and RNA) and, therefore, the detection of contamination in food is carried out with high selectivity and rapidity. In the last 2 decades molecular methods have accompanied traditional diagnostic methods in routine pathogen detection, and might replace them in the upcoming future. In this review the implementation in diagnostics of four of the most used molecular techniques (PCR, NASBA, microarray, LDR) are described and compared, highlighting advantages and limitations of each of them. Drawbacks of molecular methods with regard to traditional ones and the difficulties encountered in pathogen detection from food or clinical specimen are also discussed. Moreover, criteria for the choice of the target sequence for a secure detection and classification of pathogens and possible developments in molecular diagnostics are also proposed.
分子方法可用于检测病原体的核酸（DNA 和 RNA），因此，可采用高度选择性和快速的方法检测食品污染。在过去的 20 年中，分子方法已伴随传统诊断方法用于常规病原体检测，并可能在未来取代它们。本文描述并比较了最常用的四种分子技术（PCR、NASBA、微阵列、LDR）在诊断中的应用，强调了它们各自的优缺点。还讨论了分子方法相对于传统方法的缺点，以及从食品或临床标本中检测病原体时遇到的困难。此外，还提出了针对病原体安全检测和分类的靶序列选择标准，以及分子诊断的可能发展方向。
