RESUMO
AIM:To establish a TaqMan RT-qPCR method for surveiling the spread of oncolytic virus M1 in tissue,helping control the dosage and assessing the safety of virus. METHODS:A TaqMan-based one-step RT-qPCR method for the detection and quantification of oncolytic virus M1 in the tissues was established. The virus load and distri-bution in the tissues of SD rats,cynomolgus monkeys and nude mice were also investigated. RESULTS:A pair of specific primers(Q3)and the standard viral RNA for SYBR Green RT-qPCR were screened and selected with the best specificity and amplification efficiency. By optimizing the experiment conditions,we found that the annealing temperature above 62℃reduced matrix effect but affected the amplification efficiency. So we established a one-step TaqMan RT-qPCR method and redesigned a pair of Q3 short primers(Q3S). Using the one-step TaqMan RT-qPCR and Q3S primer,the stan-dard RNA with low copy numbers was specifically detected under the background of mixed matrix RNA of SD rats or cyno-molgus monkeys. Furthermore,the method was verified to be suitable for detecting tissue distribution of M1 virus in the mice,SD rats and cynomolgus monkeys. CONCLUSION:The TaqMan-based one-step RT-qPCR constructed with Q3S primer can be used for M1 virus quantification in various tissue samples of different animals with better specificity and sen-sitivity,and may be further applied to the detection of clinical samples.