%A Honore N
%A Perrani E
%A Telenti A
%A Grosset J
%A Cole ST


%T A simple and rapid technique for the detection of rifampin resistance in <i>Mycobacterium leprae</i>

%0 Journal Article

%D 1993

%J International Journal of Leprosy and other Mycobacterial Diseases

%P 0148-916X

%V 61

%N 4

%X The rifampin resistance of<i> Mycobacterium leprae</i> is due to missense mutations in the <i>rpoB</i> gene encoding the <i>&#946;</i>-subunit of the essential enzyme RNA polymerase. A rapid and very simple method has been developed to detect rifampin resistance in small numbers of <i>M. leprae</i> present in biopsies. It involves polymerase chain reaction amplification of a defined region of the <i>rpoB</i> gene followed by single-strand conformational polymorphism analysis (PCR-SSCP). The reliability of the method has been tested on a sample of known drug-resistant and susceptible isolates of <i>M. leprae.</i>