SYBR Green-Based Real-Time Quantitative PCR Assay for Detection of West Nile Virus Circumvents False-Negative Results Due to Strain Variability

Abstract excerpt

Real-time quantitative PCR is used routinely for the high-throughput diagnosis of viral pathogens, such as West Nile virus (WNV). Rapidly evolving RNA viruses present a challenge for diagnosis because they accumulate mutations that may render them undetectable. To explore the effect of sequence variations on assay performance, we generated every possible single point mutation within the target region of the...