| Summary: | Philosophiae Doctor - PhD === Species of Campylobacter, Arcobacter and Helicobacter have been associated with various diseases in humans and animals; and chickens have been identified as a reservoir of these microorganisms. Two published techniques and a new technique, developed in this dissertation, were evaluated to test its efficiency in removing PCR inhibitors from chicken samples. All of the techniques were based on agarose/DNA slants and were evaluated using multiplex PCR and an Internal Amplification Control. The new technique was found to be most effective and consequently used further in the study. A novel study was done to evaluate the survival of Campylobacter, Arcobacter and Helicobacter strains in chicken blood at -20, 4, 37 and 42ºC as well as at ambient room temperature (±222ºC). It was found that all strains could survive at all temperatures, albeit at different duration times. Most notably, an A. butzleri strain was able to survive at 4ºC for up to 297 days. === South Africa
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