Gilchrist Carol A, Turner Stephen D, Riley Margaret F, Petri William A, Hewlett Erik L
Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, USA
Department of Public Health, School of Medicine, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, USA.
Clin Microbiol Rev. 2015 Jul;28(3):541-63. doi: 10.1128/CMR.00075-13.
In addition to the ever-present concern of medical professionals about epidemics of infectious diseases, the relative ease of access and low cost of obtaining, producing, and disseminating pathogenic organisms or biological toxins mean that bioterrorism activity should also be considered when facing a disease outbreak. Utilization of whole-genome sequencing (WGS) in outbreak analysis facilitates the rapid and accurate identification of virulence factors of the pathogen and can be used to identify the path of disease transmission within a population and provide information on the probable source. Molecular tools such as WGS are being refined and advanced at a rapid pace to provide robust and higher-resolution methods for identifying, comparing, and classifying pathogenic organisms. If these methods of pathogen characterization are properly applied, they will enable an improved public health response whether a disease outbreak was initiated by natural events or by accidental or deliberate human activity. The current application of next-generation sequencing (NGS) technology to microbial WGS and microbial forensics is reviewed.
除了医学专业人员一直关注的传染病流行问题外，获取、生产和传播致病生物或生物毒素相对容易且成本低廉，这意味着在面对疾病暴发时也应考虑生物恐怖主义活动。在暴发分析中使用全基因组测序（WGS）有助于快速准确地识别病原体的毒力因子，并可用于确定人群中疾病传播的路径，以及提供有关可能来源的信息。诸如WGS之类的分子工具正在迅速改进和发展，以提供强大且分辨率更高的方法来识别、比较和分类致病生物。如果这些病原体特征分析方法得到恰当应用，无论疾病暴发是由自然事件、意外还是蓄意的人类活动引发，都将改善公共卫生应对措施。本文综述了下一代测序（NGS）技术在微生物全基因组测序和微生物法医学中的当前应用。
