My MSc thesis was about the role of coliphages as indicators for bacterial and virus pollution in deep aquifers in Mexico City.
However, according to the review of Schulz and Dickschat (2007) on bacterial VOC emissions, most of the substances we identified are known indicators for bacterial growth.
To overcome the shortcomings of CFU enumeration pointed out above, a number of alternative, cultivation-independent methods have been applied over the years to get hold of indicators for bacterial cell viability.
However, the utilization of indicators for bacterial viability-such as the presence of specific transcripts or membrane integrity-would overcome bias introduced by cultivation and reduces the time span of analysis from initiation to read out.
Furthermore, PSD does not seem to be a clear indicator for a bacterial contamination at the investigated spring, at least for this particular event.
These high values suggested that sTREM-1 was a reasonably reliable indicator for diagnosing bacterial infections.
After incubation period, 40 μL of p-iodonitrotetrazolium violet (INT) (0.2 mg/mL) was added to the wells to serve as an indicator of bacterial growth and incubated at 37°C for 1 hour.
An increased CRP level on the rapid test is an indicator of bacterial infection, and the CRP rapid test has been shown to be particularly useful for diagnosing bacterial sinusitis in general practice, including for prescribing antibiotics.
Bacteremia is a good indicator of bacterial virulence as it reflects bacterial survival upon invasion of the bloodstream.
