MycoLight™ PMA [Propidium Monoazide]

The common PCR assays have been routinely used for simple, sensitive, and specific pathogen identification. However, regular PCR assays cannot be used to distinguish between live and dead cells. The number of pathogens is always overestimated by the regular PCR assays. Viability PCR (vPCR) is an evolution of PCR. The simple pre-treatment of a test sample by specifically intercalating a photo-reactive reagent to the DNA of dead cells enables the selective PCR detection of DNA in live cells. The capability to selectively detect the DNA of living cells becomes very important, such as, in the fields of food safety, water quality control, infectious diseases, veterinary applications and ecological dynamics etc. Propidium monoazide (PMA) is one of the most common vPCR reagents for the selective detection of DNA of live cells. The PMA is a membrane-impermeable dye that selectively penetrates membranes of dead cells. Once inside a dead cell, PMA intercalates into the DNA and can be covalently cross-linked to it. This effect will strongly inhibit PCR amplification and leads to elimination of positive signals from dead cells. The PMA-based vPCR has been used for detecting emetic and non-emetic B. cereus and other bacterial pathogens. However, PMA is extremely light-sensitive, thus needs to be operated under the dark conditions. AAT Bioquest recently introduced MycoLight™ vPCR350. It is much less light sensitive (to the room light) than PMA, thus can be used under room light. It is a significantly improved version of PMA-like vPCR reagent. It is a novel non-fluorescent DNA modifier specifically designed for viability PCR (vPCR) targeting microorganisms such as bacteria, eukaryotes, viruses, and fungi. It represents a significant advancement over the widely used viability dye PMA (propidium monoazide), offering enhanced performance and specificity compared to PMA.

Page updated on January 31, 2025