{"id":3157,"date":"2014-10-02T10:32:52","date_gmt":"2014-10-02T15:32:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/?p=3157"},"modified":"2014-10-02T10:32:52","modified_gmt":"2014-10-02T15:32:52","slug":"a-litmus-test-for-bacteria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/a-litmus-test-for-bacteria\/","title":{"rendered":"A litmus test for bacteria<img src=\"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/canada_flag_icon_small.gif\">"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_3158\" style=\"width: 410px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Litmus-test.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-3158\" class=\"size-full wp-image-3158\" src=\"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Litmus-test.jpg\" alt=\"In these test samples, those labelled \u2018+\u2019 have E. coli bacteria present, while those labelled \u2018-\u2019 do not. A chemical agent couples the presence of bacteria to changes in pH, which in turn is associated with a colour change via a standard litmus test. The system provides a simple, cheap and effective test for the presence of harmful bacteria. (Photo credit: Kha Tram)\" width=\"400\" height=\"303\" srcset=\"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Litmus-test.jpg 400w, http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Litmus-test-300x227.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-3158\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">In these test samples, those labelled \u2018+\u2019 have E. coli bacteria present, while those labelled \u2018-\u2019 do not. A chemical agent couples the presence of bacteria to changes in pH, which in turn is associated with a colour change via a standard litmus test. The system provides a simple, cheap and effective test for the presence of harmful bacteria. (Photo credit: Kha Tram)<\/p><\/div>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Researchers have developed a way to use litmus paper &#8211; which changes colour to indicate high or low pH &#8211; to provide a simple and effective test for bacteria like E. coli.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The team used tiny strands of DNA to create probes that are activated in the presence of bacteria. The activated probes then catalyse a reaction that lowers the pH, which can be detected by a simple litmus test.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The low-cost technique could be especially useful in the developing world where lab facilities for bacterial detection are scarce.<\/p>\n<h4 dir=\"ltr\">Photos and videos are\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.bioactivepaper.com\/761\/\" target=\"_blank\">available here<\/a><\/span>.<\/h4>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/10.1002\/anie.201407021\/abstract;jsessionid=7E787108908271281F7C235AF494D857.f04t02\" target=\"_blank\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Original research paper<\/span><\/a>\u00a0published in the journal <em>Angewandte Chemie (International Edition)\u00a0<\/em>on\u00a0<strong>September\u00a011 , 2014<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><em><strong>Names and affiliations of selected\u00a0authors<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<h4 dir=\"ltr\">Yingfu Li, McMaster University, Ontario<\/h4>\n<h4 dir=\"ltr\">Kha Tram, McMaster University, Ontario<\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Researchers have developed a way to use litmus paper &#8211; which changes colour to indicate high or low pH &#8211; to provide a simple and effective test for bacteria like E. coli. The team used tiny strands of DNA to create probes that are activated in the presence of bacteria. The activated probes then catalyse [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3158,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[1544,1274,51,53,50,476],"class_list":["post-3157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-paper-of-interest","tag-bacteria","tag-dna","tag-health","tag-medicine","tag-ontario","tag-public-health"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Litmus-test.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4DqbN-OV","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3157"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3157\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3159,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3157\/revisions\/3159"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3158"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}