Food Science Commons^™

Potential For Bacteriophage Cocktail To Complement Commercial Sanitizer Use On Produce Against Escherichia Coli O157:H7, Badrinath Vengarai Jagannathan, Steven Kitchens, Paul Priyesh Vijayakumar, Stuart Price, Melissa Morgan

Animal and Food Sciences Faculty Publications

The increasing concern for food safety has created a need to evaluate novel techniques to eliminate or control pathogens, resulting in safe food. In this study, four bacteriophages of bovine origin, specific to E. coli O157:H7, were successfully isolated and characterized. A microplate reader assay demonstrated the efficacy of the bacteriophage (phage) cocktail against E. coli O157:H7 resulting in a significant reduction (p < 0.01) in the target pathogen population. The phage cocktail demonstrated significant efficacy (p < 0.05) against E. coli O157:H7 in the presence of the most utilized sanitizers in the United States, namely 100 parts per million (ppm) free chlorine and 100-ppm peroxyacetic acid. Survival in the sanitizer concentrations demonstrates the potential …