Background:

Viruses cause human diseases such as influenza, rage, yellow fever and hemorrhagic fever. In addition, they have characteristics such as high genetic variability, virulence and easy transmission and production with minimum level of infrastructure, which make them not only a public health but also a biosecurity problem. Therefore, the development of accurate and versatile biodetection systems is a challenge in which DNA microarray technology is released as an ideal system.

Objectives:

Probe design for virus detection by microarray technology.

Materials and Methods:

Virus families with interest in biodefense were selected and the complete genomes of the reference viruses were searched in the databases (GenBank). Fragments of 60 nucleotides with some specific physical characteristics were identified. Finally, cross-hybridization capacity was also evaluated with BLASTN software.

Results:

Viral genomes from nine families were obtained. A total of 54 probe nucleotides were designed, six of them corresponding to influenza A type H1N1 virus and the sequences were classified according to their identity index, allowing to predict the diagnostic capacity of the designed probes.

Conclusion:

It has been found enough sequences to identify nine virus families with interest in biodefense by means of the DNA microarray technology.