| abstract |
Methods and devices for detecting, identifying, and/or characterizing one or more bacterial organisms, including pathogenic bacterial organisms in a sample are disclosed. The methods and devices generally include selecting one or more polypeptides, e.g., epitopes, each having an amino acid sequence unique to a specific protein that is uniquely expressed by a specific bacterial organism and/or uniquely associated with one or more specific traits of each bacterial organism. The selected polypeptides can be used as a template to produce a molecularly imprinted polymer capable of specifically binding to the one or more polypeptides. |