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Updated: Mar 10, 2026

Legionella pneumophila Outer Membrane Vesicles: Isolation and Analysis of Their Pro-inflammatory Potential on Macrophages
Published on: February 22, 2017
Laboratory Tests for Legionnaire's Disease
W Michael Dunne1, Nathalie Picot2, Alex van Belkum3
1Scientific Office, BioMérieux, 100 Rodolphe Street, Durham, NC 27712, USA.
Abstract:
Legionella pneumophila is one of the more recently discovered bacterial pathogens of humans. The last 2 decades have seen tremendous progress in the evolution of diagnostic tests, for detection and characterization of this pathogen and for defining the host response to infection. This has generated several diagnostic tools that span the range from simple immunologic assays to modern genome sequencing. This review describes the state of affairs of this continuously evolving field regarding the diagnosis of Legionnaire's disease and covers detection, assessment of antibiotic susceptibility, and epidemiologic characterization of isolates of L pneumophila and other pathogenic species within the genus.
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