Detection of Salmonella Spp. in Meat and Meat Products by Culture, Biochemical and Molecular Characterization in Duhok City

MEAT and meat products are high in protein, essential amino acids, vitamins, lipids, minerals, and other nutrients, although they are nutrient-dense foods for humans. Total of 150 samples of local and imported meat and meat products were collected from different location of Duhok province from November 2021 to August 2022, as follow ,25 samples=(16.66%) from each type of meat included beef meat, burger meat, chicken meat , minced meat , sausage meat and sheep meat. The study molecular methods for detection of the target pathogen. Traditional and biochemical. The percentage of Salmonella spp isolated. as 29.3% (44/150) positive samples by using the Traditional culture methods, 23.33% (35/150) positive samples by biochemical method, and 55% (33/60) positive samples by PCR method for molecular confirmation and serological method for serotyping. Accuracy techniques from(Salmonella, culture items (counts) and Accuracy % from Salmonella True value (100%) and Accuracy 94.47%, sensitivity100%, specificity (92.8%).Salmonella spp. invAgene was found using the polymerase chain reaction (PCR). These Sal monella isolates appeared to possess the invA gene according to the PCR technique since D NA amplification produced one unique band (size 389 bp) when electrophoresed on an agar ose gel. Only 10 isolates were sent to the Gene BankNCBI for registration of the nucleotid e sequences for the 660bp of the 16sRNA gene based on the sequencing method. This was done to diagnose the isolates at a species level, The obtained nucleotide sequences for each isolate searched for their identity and molecular identification of the bacteria implementing the BLAST algorithm of the GenBank database against 16S rDNA sequences of type strains (/ BLAST) at the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI).