🦠 Serotyping of pure cultures of Salmonella spp. — guidelines of Technical Report ISO/TR 6579-3

Microbiology ISO/TR 6579-3

Overview

WHAT THE STANDARD COVERS. This is an ISO Technical Report (the ISO website calls it a "Technical Report"), not an International Standard. The description from the ISO website, quoted in full: "ISO/TR 6579-3:2014 gives guidance on the procedure for serotyping Salmonella serovars and is applicable to the serotyping of pure cultures of Salmonella spp., independent of the source from which they are isolated." The title links it to the ISO 6579 series "Microbiology of the food chain — Horizontal method for the detection, enumeration and serotyping of Salmonella"; part 1 (detection) has a separate entry in this knowledge base — PN-EN ISO 6579-1. The Polish title in the header of the entry is our translation of the English title.

STATUS (state of the ISO website on 29 September 2026). ISO website: "Published", edition 1, publication 2014-07 (stage 60.60 dated 8 July 2014), 33 pages, committee ISO/TC 34/SC 9, ICS 07.100.30, English and French versions. The last stage is 90.93 "International Standard confirmed" dated 12 July 2019, with the sentence "This publication was last reviewed and confirmed in 2019. Therefore this version remains current." The PKN catalogue search (29 September 2026) answers "Brak wyników wyszukiwania" (no search results) for "6579-3", and for "ISO/TR 6579" shows only standards of the series: PN-EN ISO 6579-1:2017-04 with amendment A1:2020-09, older editions and PN-EN ISO 6579-4:2025-07 (English version; "Part 4: Identification of monophasic Salmonella Typhimurium (1,4,[5],12:i:-) by polymerase chain reaction (PCR)"). There is no Polish edition of ISO/TR 6579-3 — laboratories cite the ISO document. No laboratory in our copy of the scopes cites part 4 yet.

HOW MANY LABORATORIES AND IN WHAT FORM (copy of the accreditation scope database, data up to 17 September 2026, read on 28 September 2026). All records of number 6579-3: 69 entries at 35 laboratories, all Polish. Forms: "ISO/TR 6579-3:2014" — 25 laboratories (34 entries); without the year, "ISO/TR 6579-3" — AB 343, AB 400, AB 437, AB 620, AB 770, AB 1029, AB 1088 and AB 1455 (22 entries); without the slash, "ISO TR 6579-3:2014" — AB 1009, AB 1908 and AB 1972; "ISO/TR 6579-3:2014-07" — AB 559; "ISO/TR 6579-3: 2014" with a space — AB 429; "ISO/TR 6579-3:2014 (E)" — AB 958. One entry of AB 620 has a footnote glued to the number in the copy ("ISO/TR 6579-32)"). The "Laboratories" tab searches for records BEGINNING with "ISO/TR 6579-3" and will show 9 laboratories (AB 400, AB 429, AB 485, AB 510, AB 517, AB 531, AB 606, AB 1088, AB 1455) — checked with the tab query on the labcoda.pl production server on 29 September 2026: 9; under "ISO TR 6579-3" — 2 (AB 1908, AB 1972). The other laboratories write the report in one string after PN-EN ISO 6579-1 and remain outside the tab.

CURRENT PCA SCOPES (read on 29 September 2026, issues from 14 November 2023 to 10 September 2026). The report stands in the valid scopes of 34 laboratories; no entry is suspended. The exception: AB 434 has two entries in our copy (PN-EN ISO 6579-1 with ISO/TR 6579-3, samples from primary production), while its valid scope (issue no. 26 of 3 April 2026) now covers only the detection of Trichinella — there are no Salmonella entries in it. Full records of the reference documents compared with the PCA documents: at AB 598 the row for raw poultry meat has three documents in the scope (issue no. 36 of 30 July 2026) — PN-EN ISO 6579, the White–Kauffmann–Le Minor scheme and ISO/TR 6579-3 — while in our copy it lacks the report; at AB 510 and AB 598 PN-EN ISO 6579-1 stands with the note "z wyłączeniem załącznika D" (excluding annex D).

WHAT THEY CITE IT FOR. Together with PN-EN ISO 6579-1 (usually with amendment A1:2020-09) in the same entry — 31 laboratories in the copy (30 in the valid scopes, without AB 434; at AB 437 and AB 606 recorded as "PN-EN ISO 6579" without the part number), for "Presence and identification of Salmonella spp." by the culture method with biochemical and serological confirmation: in samples from the primary production stage and biological material from animals (faeces, swabs, litter, dust, organs) — 25 laboratories, in food — 12, in feed — 10. The serovars Salmonella Enteritidis and Salmonella Typhimurium are named in the methodology of 10 laboratories (AB 079, AB 313, AB 343, AB 400, AB 485, AB 510, AB 562, AB 1009, AB 1029, AB 1455). Without PN-EN ISO 6579-1 the report stands at four laboratories: for strains and isolates — AB 485 ("Identification of Salmonella Enteritidis and Salmonella Typhimurium", biochemical and serological tests), AB 531 ("Identification of the Salmonella serotype", serological method, with the Kauffmann–White–Le Minor scheme) and AB 601 ("Identification of bacilli of the genus Salmonella", biochemical and serological method, with the scheme); AB 770 has "Serological identification of Salmonella spp." by slide agglutination in six groups of matrices, with procedure PB-06 "based on the Kauffmann White–Le Minor scheme and ISO/TR 6579-3". AB 400 has both kinds of entries — with PN-EN ISO 6579-1 for samples from primary production and the report alone for strains ("Identification of the Salmonella serotype").

ALONGSIDE THIS STANDARD. The White–Kauffmann–Le Minor scheme (in the scopes usually with the year 2007; AB 1415: "wyd. 9 z 2007", 9th edition of 2007) is cited for Salmonella by 39 laboratories: in the same entry as ISO/TR 6579-3 — AB 531, AB 598, AB 601, AB 620, AB 770 and AB 1951; in entries without the report — AB 379, AB 462, AB 465, AB 483, AB 486, AB 487, AB 526, AB 530, AB 537, AB 539, AB 540, AB 545, AB 546, AB 559, AB 578, AB 585, AB 598, AB 603, AB 604, AB 609, AB 614, AB 636, AB 657, AB 678, AB 819, AB 924, AB 1031, AB 1087, AB 1136, AB 1164, AB 1415, AB 1613, AB 1738 and AB 1894. Salmonella serovars or serological identification are named in the methodology of entries without this report by 56 laboratories (53 of them do not cite it anywhere; we do not count tests for antibodies in blood): for food, feed, environmental samples and strains — 33, with PN-EN ISO 6579-1, the scheme or in-house procedures; for faeces and swabs from humans — 24, with in-house procedures based, among others, on the methodological publications of NIZP-PZH and KIDL (AB 1274 has both kinds of entries). For scale: Salmonella appears in the scopes of 192 Polish laboratories (593 entries), and the number of the 6579 series in 121.

WHAT WE DO NOT GIVE. We did not have the text of the report — ISO sells it (33 pages). We do not give the course of serotyping, the set of sera, the way the result is recorded or requirements for the culture beyond what the ISO description says: a pure culture of Salmonella spp., independent of the source of isolation.

Method principle

According to the ISO description, the report gives guidance on the procedure for serotyping Salmonella serovars and applies to pure cultures of Salmonella spp., independent of the source of isolation. In accreditation scopes laboratories use it together with PN-EN ISO 6579-1 to identify Salmonella grown by the culture method with biochemical and serological confirmation, and for strains and isolates — on its own (serological method, slide agglutination). We DO NOT GIVE the course of serotyping — we did not have the text of the report.

Applications

• Serotyping of Salmonella spp. isolates from samples from primary production, food and feed — in the scopes of 31 laboratories together with PN-EN ISO 6579-1
• Identification of the serovars Salmonella Enteritidis and Salmonella Typhimurium — in the methodology of 10 laboratories citing this report
• Serotyping of strains and isolates submitted for testing — AB 400, AB 485, AB 531, AB 601; serological identification by slide agglutination — AB 770

Key parameters

Standard

Standard number

ISO/TR 6579-3:2014 (wydanie 1)

Title (PL)

Mikrobiologia łańcucha żywnościowego — Horyzontalna metoda wykrywania, oznaczania liczby i serotypowania Salmonella — Część 3: Wytyczne dotyczące serotypowania Salmonella spp.

Title (EN)

Microbiology of the food chain — Horizontal method for the detection, enumeration and serotyping of Salmonella — Part 3: Guidelines for serotyping of Salmonella spp.

Step-by-step procedure

1. Status of the document

   ISO website: edition 1 of 2014, confirmed in 2019, "this version remains current" (read on 29 September 2026); the report is not in the PKN catalogue.

2. Pure culture

   A pure culture of Salmonella spp. is serotyped, independent of the source of isolation (ISO description). In the scopes: an isolate from detection according to PN-EN ISO 6579-1 or a strain submitted for testing.

3. Serotyping

   According to the guidelines of the report; in the scopes — serological method, at AB 770 slide agglutination. The course NOT GIVEN.

4. Result

   The Salmonella serovar; the scopes name, among others, Salmonella Enteritidis and Salmonella Typhimurium.

Required equipment and apparatus

Reagents, media and consumables

Health and safety (OHS)

• Salmonella spp. are pathogenic bacteria — pure cultures are handled in a microbiology laboratory, according to its risk assessment
• NOTE ON SUBSTANCE: the "Laboratories" tab will show 9 of the 35 laboratories citing the report — the others write it in one string after PN-EN ISO 6579-1; the full list is in this description

Frequently asked questions