Review Of Nucleic Acid Amplification Technology

Providing current information and guidance on the uses of various nucleic acid amplification technologies for clinical laboratory diagnosis, this book goes beyond the Polymerase Chain Reaction to explore a broader range of important alternative DNA/RNA amplification methods including the Ligase Chain Reaction, Q[beta] Replicase Assays and TMA. There are many examples of specific applications of these technologies, discussions of yet unresolved issues and demonstrations of the relevance of these technologies to medical research and disease diagnostics. Individual chapters cover uses of these methods in clinical situations such as detection of food pathogens, viral infections, STDs, Mycobacteria drug resistance mutations, and heritable diseases. Automation, diagnostic test evaluation, and the synthesis of artificial DNA are also discussed. This book is designed for all biomedical scientists interested in the application of molecular biology to clinical diagnosis.