Patent ID: 7090972

Claim:
A method for determining whether one or more non-viral target species may be present in a sample, said method comprising the steps of: a) contacting said sample with hybridization assay means for detecting the presence of a nucleic acid variable region characteristic of nucleic acid of said one or more target species, wherein said means distinguishes said variable region from nucleic acid of at least one non-target species, wherein said variable region is present in an rRNA sequence, or a DNA sequence encoding for said rRNA sequence, in a target region corresponding to: bases 65–108 of E. coli 5S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 60–105 of E. coli 16S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 60–100 of E. coli 16S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 120–150 of E. coli 16S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 170–230 of E. coli 16S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 405–490 of E. coli 16S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 405–480 of E. coli 16S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 600–675 of E. coli 16S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 600–670 of E. coli 16S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 705–735 of E. coli 16S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 820–870 of E. coli 16S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 820–860 of E. coli 16S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 1125–1155 of E. coli 16S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 270–405 of E. coli 23S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 270–390 of E. coli 23S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 535–575 of E. coli 23S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 535–560 of E. coli 23S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 1150–1200 of E. coli 23S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 1440–1600 of E. coli 23S rRNA or the encoding DNA; bases 1710–1750 of E. coli 23S rRNA or the encoding DNA; or bases 2190–2330 of E. coli 23S rRNA or the encoding DNA; and b) determining whether said means has detected the presence of said variable region as an indication that at least one member of said one or more target species is present in said sample.