Related Experiment Video
Updated: Apr 29, 2026
Tracking Microbial Contamination in Retail Environments Using Fluorescent Powder - A Retail Delicatessen Environment Example
Published on: March 5, 2014
Run-off studies demonstrate parallel transport behaviour for a marker of poultry fecal contamination and
J Weidhaas1, E Garner, T Basden
1Civil and Environmental Engineering, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV, USA.
Aims:
To determine whether poultry litter marker gene LA35 is correlated with pathogens and fecal indicator bacteria (FIB) in run-off from poultry litter-amended plots.
Methods And Results:
A rainfall simulator with various vegetative filter strip lengths was employed to evaluate the correlation of a microbial source tracking (MST) marker for poultry feces/litter (the 16S rRNA gene of Brevibacterium sp. LA35 [LA35] measured by quantitative PCR) with pathogens and FIB in run-off. LA35 was correlated with Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli, Enterococcus spp. and Bacteroidales levels. Salmonella was present at low concentration in litter, but became undetectable by qPCR in run-off. Escherichia coli, LA35 and Staph. aureus exhibited mass-based first flush behaviour in the run-off.
Conclusions:
Correlation of LA35 with FIB and pathogens in run-off from poultry litter-amended fields suggest comparable transport mechanisms and that LA35 is a useful tracer for harmful bacteria in the environment released from poultry litter.
Significance And Impact Of The Study:
To protect human health, an effective marker for poultry fecal contamination should exhibit similar fate and transport characteristics compared to pathogens. This study is among the first to demonstrate such a relationship in run-off for a MST marker.
