Development of an Alternative Screening Method for Detecting Evidence of Mycobacterium Tuberculosis Infections

This Small Business Innovation research Phase I proposes the development of a practical and reliable in-vitro test for detecting the evidence of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) infection as an alternative to the tuberculin skin test (PPD-TST) and to the interferon gamma release assays (IGRAs). The proposed methodology will be a powerful detection technology in clinical diagnosis owing to its detection sensitivity. Tuberculosis is caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacterium. Tuberculosis (TB) remains to be one of the major causes of death from a single infectious agent worldwide. An estimated 2 billion people are infected all over the world with this disease. According to WHO global tuberculosis control report 2010, there were ~ 9.4 million reported new cases and 1.7 million people lost their lives from TB in 2009. Because of the increase in Multidrug-resistance (MDR) problems, there is an increased concern in the spread of Tuberculosis worldwide. Here, for the first time we are utilizing a synthetic biology based variant PCR technique to develop next generation MTB detection tools