Detection and Occurrence of Indicator Organisms and Pathogens

Abstract

A review of the literature published in 2009 is presented on topics related to occurrence and detection of fecal indicators and pathogens. This review is divided into three major sections: environmental occurrence, persistence, and transport; detection methods; and microbial source tracking. The first section is subdivided into persistence and transport of fecal indicator bacteria, particle association and transport, microbial quality of recreational beaches, occurrence of fecal indicators bacteria and pathogens in watersheds, irrigation systems, estuaries, and wetlands, and novel indicators. The second section describes the studies related to endpoint PCR and reverse transcription PCR, real‐time PCR, loop mediated isothermal amplification, array based genetic and phenotype based diagnostics, and genotyping. The third section covers genotypic and phenotypic microbial source tracking methods.