Patent ID: 7294489

Claim:
A method of detecting Mycobacterium species present in a biological sample, comprising the steps of: providing a biological sample containing nucleic acid from at least one Mycobacterium species comprising a Mycobacterium 16S ribosomal RNA (rRNA) or DNA encoding a Mycobacterium 16S rRNA; amplifying the Mycobacterium 16S rRNA or Mycobacterium DNA encoding the Mycobacterium 16S rRNA in an in vitro nucleic acid amplification mixture comprising at least one polymerase activity, and a combination of at least one first oligonucleotide and at least one second oligonucleotide, wherein the first oligonucleotide consists of a target-specific sequence that consists of SEQ ID NO:5 that is joined to a 5′ promoter sequence, and the second oligonucleotide is an oligonucleotide consisting of 19 to 25 bases made up of contiguous bases 1 to 18 of SEQ ID NO:24 and optionally three to seven bases 5′ to the contiguous bases 1 to 18 of SEQ ID NO:24 and/or optionally one base 3′ to the contiguous bases 1 to 18 of SEQ ID NO:24 to produce amplified Mycobacterium nucleic acid; and detecting the amplified Mycobacterium nucleic acid by detecting a label associated with the amplified Mycobacterium nucleic acid.