USE OF FOURIER TRANSFORM-INFRARED SPECTROSCOPY TO DIFFERENTIATE CLINICALLY RELEVANT BACTERIA

Fourier-Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FT-IR) was employed to differentiate 14 bacterial strains [ Escherichia coli (n = 2), Pseudomonas aeruginosa (n = 3), Proteus mirabilis (n = 1), Klebsiella pneumoniae (n = 2), Staphylococcus aureus (n = 5) and Staphylococcus saprophyticus (n = 1)] from the collections of the "Juan P. Garraham" Paediatrics Hospital, Buenos Aires City, Argentina, and the American Type Culture Collection (ATCC). For each strain studied, the phenotype was determined from pure cultures as reproducible and specific infrared (IR) absorption spectra. A dendogram was obtained by clustering analysis of the obtained spectra to establish the differences among the studied strains, allowing its discrimination at the species level. FT-IR is a fast technique which requires small amounts of biomass allowing to analyse many samples a day. Moreover, its easy application, the no use of reactive and its reduced time consumption make this technique an appropriate tool for clinical microbiology.