Real-time PCR in Food Science: Introduction.

Food safety and quality control programmes are increasingly applied throughout the production food chain in order to guarantee added value products as well as to minimize the risk of infection for the consumer. The development of real-time PCR has represented one of the most significant advances in food diagnostics as it provides rapid, reliable and quantitative results. These aspects become increasingly important for the agricultural and food industry. Different strategies for real-time PCR diagnostics have been developed including unspecific detection independent of the target sequence using fluorescent dyes such as SYBR Green, or by sequence-specific fluorescent oligonucleotide probes such as TaqMan probes or molecular beacons.