Abstract
AbstractNowadays, strains of the Bacillus species are widely used as probiotics for human beings, animal feed as well as plant promoting bacteria. Probiotics based on Bacillus strains are gaining increasing attention as prophylactic and therapeutic agents for several gastro-intestinal diseases. Probiotic organisms are consumed as live organisms and Bacillus cereus and other Bacillus species are found to cause two types of food poisoning, emetic [by a small cyclic polypeptide (cereulide)] and diarrheal (by three different enterotoxins). Therefore, safety evaluations of the probiotic strains are necessary. Efforts are made to assess the safety of Bacillus strains for their supposed virulence factors. Various methods for the detection of bacterial toxins are animal model based in vivo assays, tissue culture assays or biochemical techniques but these methods are expensive, time-consuming, and labor intensive. Commercially available kits can be used for easy and rapid detection of bacterial toxins. Presently, three commercial kits for Bacillus cereus enterotoxins Nhe and/or Hbl detection are available, namely, the Bacillus diarrheal enterotoxin visual immunoassay (BDE-VIA) kit (3M Tecra), B. cereus enterotoxin reversed passive latex agglutination (BCET-RPLA) kit (Oxoid), and the Duopath® Cereus Enterotoxins (Merck). These kits can be used to monitor food quality.Key wordsEnterotoxinsTECRA-VIABCET-RPLADuopath®ELISAImmunochromatography
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