ABSTRACT
A good aesthetic appeal occupies a top priority in all fields of dentistry, which leads to an increased quest and concern towards better and more efficient technological perspectives. It poses a great challenge that has always been soaring high eventually from time immemorial. Today the most promising technologies for life time efficiency and improved reliability include the use of smart materials and structures. Smart materials are being used, and are continually being developed, for medical, defensive and industrial purposes. The recent advances in the design of smart materials have created novel opportunities for their applications in bio-medical fields. One of the important application is dental restoratives.
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVES: Identification of mycobacteria to the species level is of therapeutic significance. Conventional methods are laborious and time consuming so we did 16S rRNA sequencing using a commercial MicroSeq sequencing kit, which includes DNA sequencing with software package for identification and phylogenetic analysis of clinical mycobacterial isolates. METHODS: A total of 47 mycobacteria were tested by both conventional and genotypic method using commercially available MicroSeq 500 amplification kit assay. The identification was determined by comparing the 500 bp amplified product of 16S rDNA sequence to the MicroSeq database. RESULTS: The phenotypic identification was concordant with genotypic identification in 33 (70.2%) isolates of 14 Mycobacterium tuberculosis, 11 M. fortuitum, 7 M. abscessus and 1 M. duvalii. For the discrepant isolates, identification was possible only by DNA sequencing in 14 (29.7%) isolates. The 14 discrepant isolates were 5 M. farcinogenes, 3 M. genavense, 2 M. species. nov and 1 each of M. fortuitum, M. immuogenum, M. simiae and M. wolinskyi. Of these, five were uncommon species that were difficult to identify by phenotypic method. INTERPRETATION & CONCLUSION: The MicroSeq DNA sequencing is an excellent tool for species identification of mycobacteria, which reduces the turn around time, makes repeat analysis easy as compared to phenotypic identification specially for mycobacterial isolates with ambiguous biochemical profiles.