Antibiotic resistance of thirty strains of Shigella sonnei isolated from patient of Shigellosis outbreke at Young Cheon area in 1998 was tested. Twenty-seven strains were resistant to Tr(Trimethoprim-Sulfamethoxazol) and Shigella sonnei SG-8 was resistant to Tr(Trnnethoprim-Sulfamethoxazol), Ap(Ampicillin), Cp(Cephalothin) and Pi (Piperacillin). Shigella sonnei SG-49, SG-66, and SG-73 were senstive to all tested antibiotics. Physiological characteristics of isolated Shigella sonnei SG-8, SG-49, SG-57, and SG-73 such as effect of pH, NaCl concentration and temperature on the growth, survival in adverse condition and heat resistance were investigated Growth of the strains were inhibited at pH 4 and pH 9. All strains were grown in Tryptic soy broth containing 6% of NaCl but inhibited in TSB containing 9% of NaCl except Shigella sonnei SG-73 after incubation for 18hrs at 37℃. Selected strains grew during storage at 10 but did not grow at 4.1he strains were survived in 1 % pepton solution for 15 days at 37℃. Viable cell of selected strains were decrease 45 log cycle after heat treatment for 30 miss at 60℃ but did not detect by heat treatment for 5 wins at 70℃.

Continuous outbreaks of Shigella spp. have raised concerns about the lack of rapid and on-site applicable biosensor method for Shigella detection. Since a bacteriophage has recently been employed as an emerging bio-recognition element in biosensor method, Shigella sonnei-specific bacteriophage was isolated and purified from a slaughterhouse with the final concentration of 2.0×1012 PFU/mL in this study. Analysis of purified S. sonnei-specific bacteriophage using transmission electron microscopy indicated that it possessed an icosahedral head with a relatively long non-contractile tail. It was therefore classified as a member of the Siphoviridae family. Head width, head length, and tail length were 69.9±11.2 nm, 77.5±8.8 nm, and 264.4±33.9 nm, respectively. The genomic DNA size of the S. sonnei-specific bacteriophage was determined to be approximately 25 kb by using 0.4% agarose gel electrophoresis. In specificity test with 43 food-associated microorganisms, the S. sonnei-specific bacteriophage exhibited a clear plaque against S. sonnei only. In addition, the S. sonnei-specific bacteriophage was stable within a wide range of pH values (pH 3-11) and temperatures (4-37 ). Thus, the present study demonstrated the excellent specificity and stability of the S. sonnei-specific bacteriophage as a novel bio-recognition element for S. sonnei detection in foods.