Background: The purpose of the present study was to examine the inactivation of Salmonella enterica (50 μL; 10 CFU g ), Listeria monocytogenes (50 μL; 10 CFU g ), and murine norovirus (MNV-1; 50 μL; 10 50% tissue culture infectious dose (TCID ) mL ) on whole and fresh-cut strawberries after 2 min disinfection treatments (water (H O), chlorine 200 mg L (NaClO), water-assisted ultraviolet-C (UV-C) (WUV), and the combination WUV and 40 mg L of PA (WUV + PA)) in a water tank (15 L) equipped with 4 UV-C lamps (17.2 W each), and after 7 days of cold storage (4 and 10 °C). For MNV-1, dry UV-C treatment (DUV) was also tested.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFFollowing the market trends, the consumption of fresh and cold-pressed juice in Europe is increasing. However, a primary concern - particularly in apple juice - is the related outbreaks caused by food-borne pathogens. One of the challenges is to find methods able to reduce pathogenic loads while avoiding deterioration of nutritional properties and bioactive compounds that occur in thermal pasteurization processes.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSpore-forming bacteria are a great concern for fruit juice processors as they can resist the thermal pasteurization and the high hydrostatic pressure treatments that fruit juices receive during their processing, thus reducing their microbiological quality and safety. In this context, our objective was to evaluate the efficacy of Ultraviolet-C (UV-C) light at 254 nm on reducing bacterial spores of , and at two stages of orange juice production. To simulate fruit disinfection before processing, the orange peel was artificially inoculated with each of the bacterial spores and submitted to UV-C light (97.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDisinfection of fruits is one of the most important steps since they are going to be eaten fresh-or minimally-processed. This step affects quality, safety, and shelf-life of the product. Despite being a common sanitizer in the fruit industry, chlorine may react with organic matter leading to the formation of toxic by-products.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe risk posed by outbreaks associated with strawberries together with the safety issues of by-products from chlorine disinfection in the fruit industry has led to a search for alternative sanitizers. The disinfection capacity of peracetic acid (PA) at three concentrations (20, 40 and 80 ppm) and washing times (1 and 2 min) was compared to sodium hypochlorite (200 ppm) (NaClO) treatments and a water control, and its influence on the physico-chemical, biochemical and nutritional quality of strawberries was also studied. Counts on total aerobic mesophilic microorganisms were comparable between NaClO and PA.
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