Molecular Method Development to Identify Foodborne Sarcocystishominis in Raw Beef Commercial Hamburger

Sarcocystisspp. is zoonotic parasitic pathogen endangering safety of meat and derived meat products such as hamburgers which is among the most popular fast foods worldwide.. The current study aimed to design a protocol for molecular identification of Sarcocystis hominis in commercial hamburgers using PCR-RFLP with target of 18S rRNA.. A total of 25 raw commercial hamburger samples were randomly collected from supermarkets of Yazd city, Iran. Five mm slices from different parts of each sample were selected, well mixed, and then preserved in ethanol 70% at -20°C for the next steps. The genomic DNA was extracted using salting out method. Detection and identification of Sarcocystis isolates were performed using PCR-RFLP. The 18s rRNA gene sequence was mined from GenBank and the specific primer pair was designed using Primer3 software. Restriction fragment length polymorphims (RFLP) analysis was performed using BfaI and RsaI restriction enzymes. The digestion was analyzed, using agarose gel electrophoresis alongside 100base pair DNA ladder.. Among 25 commercial hamburger samples, 17 samples showed a PCR product around 900 bp which could detect Sarcocyst Spp. After RFLP with BfaI, the restriction fragments of 376 bp and 397 bp detected S. hominis or S. hirsuta and fragments of 184 bp, 371 bp and 382 bp detected S. cruzi. After RFLP with RsaI, the restriction fragments of 376 bp and 557 bp detected S. hirsuta and fragment of 926 bp, without any digestion, detected S. hominis. For verification, each species detected in samples was randomly selected and sent for sequencing and the results were analyzed with BLAST.. In conclusion, the current study developed a practical technique to detect the prevalence of S. hominis in meat products such as hamburgers..