DETECTION AND QUANTIFICATION OF FAECAL POLLUTION IN AN ENVIRONMENTAL SAMPLE

摘要

The present invention relates to oligonucleotides, uses thereof and methods for the detection and/or quantification of faecal pollution in environmental samples, especially of human and/or ruminant faecal pollution, as well as for the discrimination between human and ruminant faecal pollution in environmental samples. The oligonucleotides of the present invention can be used to specifically target a human and/or a ruminant marker sequence. The oligonucleotides are therefore especially useful as primers and/or probes in a method comprising a real time PCR. The invention can be applied in the field of microbial source tracking (MST) and in quantitative microbial risk assessment (QMRA) studies as part of water safety plans.