Infectious and Rare Diseases

Molecular Diagnostics of Infectious Diseases

From  past several years, the development and application of molecular diagnostic techniques had made an revolution in the diagnosis and monitoring of infectious diseases. Molecular diagnostics are used to identify infectious diseases like chlamydia, influenza virus and tuberculosis. Genetic identification can be made for example a loop-mediated isothermal amplification test diagnoses the malaria parasite in the developing countries. But despite these advances in genome analysis, in 2013 infections are still more often identified by other means like proteome, bacteriophage, or chromatographic profile. Molecular diagnostics are  used to understand the specific strain of the pathogen—for example by detecting which drug resistance genes it possesses—and hence which therapies to avoid.