Research Publications (Food Safety)

Fusarium head blight (FHB) is one of the most serious diseases of small-grain cereals worldwide, resulting in yield reduction and an accumulation of the mycotoxin deoxynivalenol (DON) in grain. Weather conditions are known to have a significant effect on the ability of fusaria to infect cereals and produce toxins. In the past 10 years, severe outbreaks of FHB, and grain DON contamination exceeding the EU health safety limits, have occurred in countries in the Baltic Sea region.

The scientific rationality of farmers’ grain storage technology and equipment is crucial for the biosecurity of grain in the main grain-producing areas represented by Northeast China. In this paper, four farmer grain storage mock silos of different widths were used as a means to track an experimental cycle of grain storage.

Tetrodotoxins (TTXs) are potentially lethal paralytic toxins that have been identified in European shellfish over recent years. Risk assessment has suggested comparatively low levels (44 µg TTX-equivalent/kg) but stresses the lack of data on occurrence. Both bacteria and dinoflagellates were suggested as possible biogenic sources, either from an endogenous or exogenous origin.

Fumonisin B1 (FB1) is among the most common contaminants produced by Fusarium spp. fungus from corns and animal feeds. Although FB1 has been known to cause physical or functional defects of embryos in humans and several animal species such as Syrian hamsters, rabbits, and rodents, little is known about the precise toxicity to the embryos and the underlying mechanisms have not been fully addressed.

As aflatoxins are a global risk for humans and animals, testing methods for rapid on-site screening are increasingly needed alongside the standard analytical laboratory tools.

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a global crisis for human public health which threatens the effective prevention and control of ever-increasing infectious diseases. The advent of pandrug-resistant bacteria makes most, if not all, available antibiotics invalid. Meanwhile, the pipeline of novel antibiotics development stagnates, which prompts scientists and pharmacists to develop unconventional antimicrobials.

Environmental Microbiology Reports, EarlyView.

Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety, EarlyView. Many important food bioactive compounds are plant secondary metabolites that have traditional applications for health promotion and disease prevention. However, the chemical instability and poor bioavailability of these compounds represent major challenges to researchers.

Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety, EarlyView. Abstract

Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety, EarlyView. D-allulose is the C-3 epimer of D-fructose, which rarely exists in nature, and can be biosynthesized from D-fructose by the catalysis of D-psicose 3-epimerase. D-allulose is safe for human consumption and was recently approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration for food applications.

This study investigates the feasibility of material recycling for retrieved gillnets from the Baltic Sea collected during a campaign of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Germany. Fragments from the material were analysed by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy revealing polyamide 6 (PA6), polypropylene (PP) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) in net material, swim lines and sink lines, respectively.

Members of the family Zoogloeaceae within the order Rhodocyclales are found to play vital roles in terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems by participating in biofloc formation in activated sludge, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon degradation, and nitrogen metabolism, such as denitrification and nitrogen fixation. Here, two bacterial strains designated H1-1-2AT and ZN11-R3-1 affiliated to the family Zoogloeaceae were isolated from coastal wetland habitats.

Listeria monocytogenes (Lm) is a foodborne pathogen causing listeriosis. Invasive forms of the disease mainly manifest as septicaemia, meningitis and maternal-neonatal infections. Lm-associated respiratory infections are very rare and little known. We reported two Lm respiratory infection cases occurred in Central Italy during the summer of 2020, in the midst of the SARS-CoV2 pandemic.

by Linghuan Zhu, Sha Xu, Youran Li, Guiyang Shi

Author(s): Daniel Berdejo, Elisa Pagán, Natalia Merino, Laura Botello-Morte, Rafael Pagán, Diego García-Gonzalo The high prevalence of Salmonella enterica in milk poses a risk of considerable concern in the preservation of certain dairy products, mainly those elaborated from raw milk. Essential oils (EOs) have been proposed as a promising food preservative for such products due to their strong antimicrobial properties.

Author(s): Hui Zou, Ling Wang, Jianya Zhao, Yan Yuan, Tao Wang, Jianchun Bian, Zongping Liu

Author(s): Pengfei Liu, Zhengqiang Jin, Chunyan Dai, Lanping Guo, Xiuming Cui, Ye Yang

Author(s): Yan Chen, Gaojie Li, Jingjing Yang, Xuyao Zhao, Zuoliang Sun, Hongwei Hou

Author(s): Elahe Abedi, Kiana Pourmohammadi, Maryam Mousavifard, Mehran Sayadi

Author(s): Dongling Shi, Hui Shi

Author(s): Sushumna Sri Canakapalli, Lina Sheng, Luxin Wang

Vibrio cholerae the causative agent of cholera, uses a large number of coordinated transcriptional regulatory events to transition from its environmental reservoir to the host intestine, which is its preferred colonization site.

MSMEG_2295 is a TetR family protein encoded by the first gene of a Mycobacterium smegmatis (Msm) operon that expresses the gene for DinB2 (MSMEG_2294), a translesion DNA repair enzyme. We have carried out investigations to understand its function by performing DNA binding studies and gene knockout experiments.

Strain EAR8T is a root endophyte isolated from Arthrocnemum macrostachyum plants collected from the Odiel marshes, Huelva (Spain). It presented in vitro plant growth-promoting properties and improved the plant growth and heavy metal accumulation in polluted soils playing an important role in phytoremediation strategies.

Contamination of agricultural soil by chromium (Cr) is a serious menace to environmental safety and global food security. Although potential of salicylic acid (SA) in mitigating heavy metal (HM) toxicity in plants is well recognized, detailed physiological mechanisms behind such beneficial effects under Cr-stress in tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) plant are far from being completely unravelled.