Rapid Identification of Bacteria Directly from Blood Cultures by Co-magnetic Bead Enrichment and MALDI-TOF MS Profiling

Abstract Direct identification of bacteria in blood cultures using matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS) is interfered with by a variety of non-bacterial proteins derived from blood cells and culture media. Thus, appropriate pre-treatments are needed for successful identification. Here, the bacteria in blood culture bottles were enriched using co-magnetic beads and processed for MALDI-TOF MS profiling. In this strategy, the Fc-containing mannose-binding lectin-coated Fe3O4 (Fc-MBL@Fe3O4) is incorporated with human IgG-coated Fe3O4 (IgG@Fe3O4) to form co-magnetic beads, which can recognize both Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. Compared to single magnetic beads Fc-MBL@Fe3O4 or IgG@Fe3O4, co-magnetic beads resulted in better bacterial capture efficiency and, therefore, could decrease the false-negative results. Our proposed strategy is much more suitable for enrichment of clinically unknown bacteria from blood culture bottles for MALDI-TOF MS database identification.