Research Publications (Food Safety)

Authentication of dairy and meat products is important to ensure fair competition, consumer benefit, and food safety. The large difference in price between camel and cow milk may be an incentive to adulterate camel dairy products with cow-derived foodstuffs. However, no studies so far have used triplex real-time PCR with an endogenous control to identify camel and cow origins in dairy and meat products.

Author(s): Xu Zhang, Li Ling, Zhiyong Li, Jufang Wang

Author(s): Jungtae Na, Esther Lee, Yu-jin Kim, Mi Ji Choi, Su-Young Kim, Jeong Sun Nam, Bum Jin Yun, Beom Joon Kim

To reduce the use of conventional chemical pesticides, naturally occurring biopesticides such as bacteriophages have emerged as a promising solution, but effectiveness of these biopesticides can be limited because of their UV and desiccation instability. This study developed a biopolymer formulation to improve the phage stability, enhance the antimicrobial activity of phages, and prevent bacterial contaminations on a leaf surface in the presence of UV-A.

Staphylococcal enterotoxins are the most common cause of foodborne intoxications (staphylococcal food poisoning) and cause a wide range of diseases. With at least six variants staphylococcal enterotoxin C (SEC) stands out as particularly diverse amongst the 25 known staphylococcal enterotoxins. Some variants present unique and even host-specific features.

Over the years the growth and health of food-producing animals have been enhanced by the use of antibiotics. These have helped reduce on-farm mortalities, lower incidences of diseases and more importantly improve productivity. Generally, the utilization of antibiotics in feed has been reevaluated since bacterial pathogens have established and shared a variety of antibiotic resistance mechanisms that can easily be spread within microbial communities.

Hepatitis C is a liver disease caused by the hepatitis C virus (HCV). The treatment of HCV infection has become more complicated due to various genotypes and subtypes of HCV. Treatment of HCV has made significant advances with direct‐acting antivirals. However, for the choice of medicine or the combination of drugs for hepatitis C, it is imperative to detect and discriminate the crucial HCV genotypes.

Background and Aims Ozonated water has been used in vineyards to reduce the use of pesticides because of its presumed efficacy in the control of fungal diseases and the absence of residues. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of ozonated water treatments on the composition of grapes. Methods and Results Ozonated water was applied to grapevines of Vitis vinifera cv. Cabernet Sauvignon throughout the season.

In this study, the rainbow trout was stored for 18 days. Changes in the resistance levels in head, meat and eyes, changes of color and odor in the head and meat, changes of liquid levels in the skin and meat, were measured with Arduino. Study showed that the resistance value on the meat decreased as the storage period increased; and that the color, odor and liquid level measurement sensors could be used in identifying the food quality.

Variation in inter‐human attractiveness to mosquitoes, and the preference of mosquitoes to bite certain regions on the human host, are possible avenues for identifying lead compounds as potential mosquito attractants or repellents.

In the last years, multidimensional liquid chromatography technique became very widespread for the complete separation of non‐volatile analytes in complex matrices. The main advantage of these techniques, especially when coupled with mass spectrometry, is the enhancement of separation power or peak capacity, due to an increase in selectivity and sensitivity of the two systems.

Shiga‐toxigenic Escherichia coli (STEC) is a major bacterium responsible for disease resulting from foodborne infection, including bloody diarrhea and hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS). STEC produces important virulence factors such as Shiga toxin (Stx) 1 and/or 2. In the STEC family, some Locus for Enterocyte Effacement (LEE)‐negative STEC produce two different types of cytotoxins, Stx2 and Subtilase cytotoxin (SubAB).

BACKGROUND The contamination of milk by antibiotic residues represents risks to the health of the consumers, therefore they should be monitored.

Over the last decade, electrolyzed water (EW) produced by salt and tap water has gained importance due to its antimicrobial effects. Regarding to chlorine-based compounds, EW also used in post-harvest safety of food processing and sterilization of surfaces. The latest studies suggested that EW might act as wound healing agent due to anti-infective and cell proliferative properties.

This study investigated the prevalence, serovar distribution, antimicrobial resistance, and pulsed field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) typing of Salmonella enterica isolated from Lake Zapotlán, Jalisco, Mexico. Additionally, the association of the presence of Salmonella with physicochemical and environmental parameters was analyzed using Pearson correlation analysis and principal component analysis (PCA). Salmonella spp. were identified in 19 of 63 (30.15%) samples.

Cystic Fibrosis (CF) airways favor abnormal microbial development. Infections are considered as polymicrobial and competition can be observed between microorganisms.

Background

Febrile illness is the commonest cause of hospitalization in children <5 years in sub-Saharan Africa, and bacterial bloodstream infections and malaria are major causes of death.

Methods

We investigated the in vitro effects of Lactobacillus casei ZX633 on gut microorganism composition in infants with diarrhea. For this purpose, 103 feces samples from healthy infants (healthy group) and 300 diarrhea samples from infants (diarrhea group) were collected, and diarrhea feces were treated with L. casei ZX633, which was previously isolated from healthy infant feces (treatment group).

ABSTRACT This study evaluated the rehydration approach of mature corn grains as an alternative for high-moisture corn grain silage production in distinct corn hybrids, storage period, cultivation locations and kernel maturity at plant harvest. High-moisture corn was used as a control.

ABSTRACT

ABSTRACT

We report the complete genome sequence of P22-like Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium phage MG40, whose prophage repressor specificity is different from that of other known temperate phages.

Aspergillus flavus and Aspergillus parasiticus produce carcinogenic aflatoxins during crop infection, with extensive variations in production among isolates, ranging from atoxigenic to highly toxigenic. Here, we report draft genome sequences of one A. parasiticus isolate and nine A. flavus isolates from field environments for use in comparative, functional, and phylogenetic studies.

Food has a major impact on all aspects of health. Recent data suggest that food composition can also affect susceptibility to infections by enteropathogenic bacteria. Here, we discuss how food may alter the microbiota as well as mucosal defenses and how this can affect infection. Salmonella Typhimurium diarrhea serves as a paradigm, and complementary evidence comes from other pathogens.

Bacteria are highly interactive and possess an extraordinary repertoire of intercellular communication and social behaviors, including quorum sensing (QS). QS has been studied in detail at the molecular level, so mechanistic details are well understood in many species and are often involved in virulence. The use of different animal host models has demonstrated QS-dependent control of virulence determinants and virulence in several human pathogenic bacteria.