Genome sequencing in clinical microbiology

Abstract

The remit of the clinical microbiology laboratory encompasses analysis of samples, detection and identification of microorganisms associated with infection, determination of antibiotic susceptibilities and monitoring of pathogen spread. Although several new molecular approaches, such as nucleic acid amplification, mass spectrometry and sequence typing, have been adopted to varying extents, many of the techniques in use today would have been familiar to a nineteenth-century microbiologist