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Abstract
A wide variety of fungi and bacteria are known to contaminate fuels and fuel systems. These microbial contaminants have been linked to fuel system fouling and corrosion. The fungus Hormoconis resinae, a common jet fuel contaminant, is used in this study as a model for developing innovative risk assessment methods. A novel qPCR protocol to detect and quantify H. resinae in, and together with, total fungal contamination of fuel systems is reported. Two primer sets, targeting the markers RPB2 and ITS, were selected for their remarkable specificity and sensitivity. These primers were successfully applied on fungal cultures and diesel samples demonstrating the validity and reliability of the established qPCR protocol. This novel tool allows clarification of the current role of H. resinae in fuel contamination cases, as well as providing a technique to detect fungal outbreaks in fuel systems. This tool can be expanded to other well-known fuel-deteriorating microorganisms.
Acknowledgements
PMMS is grateful to the BAM for the award of an Adolf Martens Fellowship. All authors wish to thank I. Stephan and S. Wiltner for providing the fungal strains from the BAM collection. The authors are especially grateful to W. J. Broughton, Shaman M. Gaspar and K. Urban for collecting samples of diesel from old tanks in different parts of the world. The comments of three anonymous reviewers were extremely valuable and helped to shed a fresh light on the text, and the authors would like to thank them for this.