| abstract |
An improvement in the method of carrying out a microbial culture test, in which the culture medium of a microorganism under test includes a hydrolysable fluorogenic substrate which is enzymically hydrolysable to yield a fluorescent material, and in which test the growth is assessed by fluorescence, wherein said improvement comprises inoculating the microorganism into the culture medium at an inoculum concentration within the range 5 x 10" organisms/ml to 10 6 organisms/ml; including one or a plurality of hydrolysable fluorogenic substrates in the culture medium with the concentration of each fluorogenic substrate in the medium in the range 30 micromolar to 300 micromolar; and after cultivating the inoculated medium by incubation, measuring the fluorescence yield of the culture and retaining the culture in a form suitable for possible further incubation to yield a confirmatory culture result by another method of estimation. |