Molecular techniques to characterize the invA genes of Salmonella spp. for pathogen inactivation study in composting

Abstract

The relatively low concentration of pathogen indicators, such Salmonella, in composting sometimes causes a problem with detection when using the conventional techniques. The presence of viable but non-culturable (VBNC) organisms is also a potential problem with Salmonella detection when using conventional techniques. In this study, the molecular approach for organism recognition, known as Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), was used for characterisation the Salmonella spp. used as inoculums in composting. This study also provides a better understand about selecting the suitable primer for Salmonella spp. The specificity of the probes and primers at the species level were verified by performing NCBI-BLAST2 (Basic Local Alignment Search Tool). Primers that target the invA gene for Salmonella were selected which produce fragment lengths around 285bp (shown in Figure 1). The Salmonella spp. solutions were tested and proved contained the sequences of invA gene by using several steps of molecular techniques before used it as inoculums in composting. The laboratory scale batch composting reactors were used to examine the inactivation of Salmonella spp. The inoculate solution of Salmonella was prepared by culturing Salmonella enteritidis (ATCC13076) in tryptone broth solution for 24 hours before adding it directly into the compost material. The reduction rate of Salmonella spp. was enumerated by conventional method accordingly to the standard compost guidelines (Figure 2). The laboratory scale study showed that after composting for 8 days the numbers of Salmonella spp. were below the limits in the UK compost standard (PAS 100) which requires the compost to be free of Salmonella spp.