ENTEROVIRUS GENOMES IN WASTE-WATER - CONCENTRATION ON GLASS WOOL AND GLASS POWDER AND DETECTION BY RT-PCR

Standard methods for detecting enteroviruses in environmental samples require cell culture, which is time consuming and expensive. The rever se transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) is a rapid, sensit ive method for detecting enteroviruses in water. However, environmenta l samples often contain substances that inhibit PCR amplification of t arget RNA. Hence the virus must be concentrated by procedures that do not interfere with amplification. This study shows that virus concentr ation by adsorption onto glass powder or glass wool supports is suitab le for detecting viral genomes in treated wastewater by RT semi-nested PCR. No enterovirus genome was detected directly in 25 samples of tre ated wastewater by RT semi-nested PCR. However, samples concentrated b y adsorption onto glass wool or glass powder showed that 48% (glass po wder) and 56% (glass wool) contained virus. Secondary concentration by organic flocculation was unsuitable for detecting virus concentrated on glass wool (20% positive samples), but it helped to increase the de tection of the genome after concentration on glass powder (72% positiv e samples). (C) 1997 Elsevier Science B.V.