Polyomarvirus Testing Services
Federal and state regulatory agencies mandate the use of fecal coliforms, E. coli and/or Enterococci as microbial indicators of water quality. However, these traditional indicators of fecal pollution do not adequately assess the specific sources of pollution or the associated health risks. Many methods have been developed to identify sources of fecal contamination, and this field of study has been collectively termed Microbial Source Tracking (MST). BCS laboratories uses the presence of human-specific polyomaviruses (HPyVs), (JCV and BKV), as an indicator of human fecal pollution in environmental water. HPyVs are ubiquitous throughout the human population and serological studies speculate 60-80% of adults harbor antibodies against HPyVs. They are secreted in the urine in high titers and mostly cause asymptomatic infections. Infected individuals shed viruses throughout their life span.
We have developed and optimized a rapid and sensitive method to concentrate and extract DNA of HPyVs from environmental water samples. Primers specific for the conserved T-antigen of both JCV and BKV are used in a nested PCR reaction to detect HPyVs. The method is able to detect as little as one microliter of raw sewage added to 100-ml of water.