author(s)
Jyoti Choudhary and SK Kashyap

abstract
Mastitis is a multi-etiologic disease of the mammary gland which affects not only the health of cattle but also, economics of the dairy sector. This study was conducted for rapid identification of the etiological agent for mastitis (Staphylococcus hyicus, Mycoplasma bovis, Streptococcus uberis, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Listeria monocytogenes) directly from mastitis-infected cows by multiplex polymerase chain reaction (mPCR). A total of 40 mastitic milk samples, confirmed by the California mastitis test (CMT) were processed for identification of bacterial pathogens. The prevalence of above-mentioned pathogens was 35% of S. hyicus, 15% of M. bovis, 12.5% of Str. uberis, 12.5% of P. aeruginosa and 5% of L. monocytogenes. The most prevalent organism was S. hyicus whereas, the least one was L. monocytogenes. The sequence of sodA, uvrC, pauA, inlA, and FecR genes were used as a target for designing the primers for S. hyicus, M. bovis, Str. uberis, L. monocytogenes and P. aeruginosa respectively. mPCR was proved to be quite efficient in the rapid detection and identification of more than one pathogen at a time.