Micro Imaging Technology Adds Enterococcus Faecalis to Its Catalog of Identifiers

Micro Imaging Technology, Inc. announced that its MIT 1000 System can now identify Enterococcus faecalis, a bacterial species found in human feces and in the intestines of many warm-blooded animals; occasionally found in urinary infections and in blood and heart lesions in cases of subacute endocarditis. E. faecalis can cause life-threatening infections in humans, especially in the hospital environment, where the naturally high levels of antibiotic resistance found in E. faecalis contribute to its pathogenicity. E. faecalis has been frequently found in root canal-treated teeth which are about nine times more likely to harbor the bacteria than cases of primary infections.

"This is a significant step forward for MIT 1000 technology," said Dr. David Haavig, Micro Imaging Technology's Chief Scientist. "The completion of this Identifier demonstrates the sensitivity of this non-biological bacterial identification technology. This new Identifier gives our MIT 1000 the ability to identify a species of the genus Enterococcus. Our other Identifiers give the MIT 1000 the ability to identify Salmonella Choleraesuis, as well as Listeria genus and Staphylococcus genus, where each genus consists of multiple species, some of which can be pathogenic."

Identifiers give the MIT 1000 System the ability to identify bacteria. All Identifiers, including this new E. faecalis Identifier, as well as all future Identifiers, use the same simple chemical-free, very low-cost, one-minute sample preparation procedure and two-minute average hands-off test with no modification or addition to the MIT 1000 System. The MIT 1000 is a rapid, bacterial cell-based detection and identification system that can identify pathogenic bacteria, now including E. faecalis, in three minutes (average).

Meanwhile, MIT is working on Staphylococcus aureus, Methicillin resistant S. aureus (MRSA), and Listeria monocytogenes Identifiers.

Micro Imaging Technology, Inc. is a California-based public company that is also registered to do business under the name Micro Identification Technologies. MIT has developed and patented the MIT 1000, a stand-alone, rapid, optically-based, software driven system that can identify pathogenic bacteria and complete an identification test, after culturing, in three (3) minutes (average) at the lowest cost per test when compared to any other conventional method. It does not rely on chemical or biological agents, conventional processing, fluorescent tags, gas chromatography or DNA analysis. The process requires only clean filtered water and a sample of the unknown bacteria. Revenues for all rapid testing methods exceed $5 billion annually -- with food safety accounting for over $3.5 billion, which is expected to surpass $4.7 billion by this year according to BCC Research. In addition, the recently passed "New" U.S. Food Safety Bill is expected to further accelerate the current annual growth rate of 6.6 percent.

In June 2009, the AOAC Research Institute (AOAC RI) awarded the Company Performance Tested Methods SM (PTM) certification for the rapid identification of Listeria. The AOAC RI provides an independent third party evaluation and expert reviews of methods and will award PTM certification to methods that demonstrate performance levels equivalent or better than other certified bacteria identifying methods. The MIT System underwent hundreds of individual tests, including ruggedness and accuracy, to earn AOAC RI's certification for the identification of Listeria.