Molecular cloning is based on isolation of a DNA sequence of interest to obtain multiple copies of it in vitro. Application of this technique has become an increasingly important tool in clinical microbiology due to its simplicity, cost effectiveness, rapidity, and reliability. This review entails the recent advances in molecular cloning and its application in the clinical microbiology in the context of polymicrobial infections, recombinant antigens, recombinant vaccines, diagnostic probes, antimicrobial peptides, and recombinant cytokines. Culture-based methods in polymicrobial infection have many limitation, which has been overcome by cloning techniques and provide gold standard technique. Recombinant antigens produced by cloning technique are now being used for screening of HIV, HCV, HBV, CMV, Treponema pallidum, and other clinical infectious agents. Recombinant vaccines for hepatitis B, cholera, influenza A, and other diseases also use recombinant antigens which have replaced the use of live vaccines and thus reduce the risk for adverse effects. Gene probes developed by gene cloning have many applications including in early diagnosis of hereditary diseases, forensic investigations, and routine diagnosis. Industrial application of this technology produces new antibiotics in the form of antimicrobial peptides and recombinant cytokines that can be used as therapeutic agents.

分子克隆的基础是分离感兴趣的DNA序列，以在体外获得其多个拷贝。由于其简单性，成本效益，快速性和可靠性，该技术的应用已成为临床微生物学中越来越重要的工具。这篇综述涉及分子克隆的最新进展及其在微生物感染，重组抗原，重组疫苗，诊断探针，抗菌肽和重组细胞因子方面在临床微生物学中的应用。微生物感染中基于培养的方法有很多局限性，已被克隆技术克服并提供了金标准技术。通过克隆技术产生的重组抗原现已用于筛查HIV，HCV，HBV，CMV，梅毒螺旋体等临床感染因子。乙型肝炎，霍乱，甲型流感和其他疾病的重组疫苗也使用重组抗原，这些抗原已取代活疫苗的使用，从而降低了产生不良反应的风险。通过基因克隆开发的基因探针具有许多应用，包括在遗传性疾病的早期诊断，法医调查和常规诊断中。该技术的工业应用产生了可用作治疗剂的抗菌肽和重组细胞因子形式的新抗生素。