Kaili Sun

Abstract: Tuberculosis (TB) remains a major cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, particularly in developing countries. A rapid and efficient method for TB diagnosis is indispensable to check the trend of tuberculosis expansion. The emergence of drug-resistant bacteria has increased the challenge of rapid drug resistance tests. Due to its high specificity and sensitivity, bacteriophage-based diagnosis is intensively pursued. In this review, we mainly described mycobacteriophage-based diagnosis in TB detection, especially two prevalent approaches: fluorescent reporter phage and phage amplified biologically assay (PhaB). The rationale of reporter phage is that phage carrying fluorescent genes can infect host bacteria specifically. Phage amplified biological assay based on the principle that phages can infect the live Mycobacterium tuberculosis in the specimen under suitable conditions and produce plaques. Other phage-based diagnostic methods, such as a combination of the amplified biologically assay and nucleic acid amplification or lateral flow assays, are also actively explored. This review will help us improve the understanding of mycobacteriophages in TB detection and better promote the development of the rapid diagnosis of M. tuberculosis.