Identification of fecal Escherichia coli from humans and animals by ribotyping

Fecal pollution of water resources is an environmental problem of increasin g importance. Identification of individual host sources of fecal Escherichi a coli, such as humans, pets, production animals, and wild animals, is prer equisite to formulation of remediation plans. Ribotyping has been used to d istinguish fecal E. coli of human origin from pooled fecal E. coil isolates of nonhuman origin. We have extended application of this technique to dist inguishing fecal E. coli ribotype patterns from human and seven individual nonhuman hosts. Classification accuracy was best when the analysis was limi ted to three host sources. Application of this technique to identification of host sources of fecal coliforms in water could assist in formulation of pollution reduction plans.