Antimicrobial efficacy of lauric arginate against Campylobacter jejuni and spoilage organisms on chicken breast fillets.

The objectives of this study were to determine the antimicrobial efficacy of lauric arginate (LAE) against Campylobacter jejuni (in broth and on chicken breast fillets) and spoilage microorganisms (on chicken breast fillets). In vitro antimicrobial activity of LAE was determined by treating C. jejuni (in pure culture) with 0 (control), 50, 100, and 200 mg/L of LAE solutions at 4°C for 2 h. Inoculated chicken samples with C. jejuni were treated with 0, 200, and 400 mg/kg of LAE, packaged, and stored at 4°C for 7 d for determining the efficacy of LAE against C. jejuni on meat. Noninoculated skinless chicken breast fillet samples were treated with 0, 200, and 400 mg/kg of LAE and were used for analysis of LAE treatments on growth of mesophilic and psychrotrophic organisms on d 0, 3, 9, and 14 during storage at 4°C. Lauric arginate was highly effective against C. jejuniin vitro with no detectable survivors. Lauric arginate significantly (P ≤ 0.05) reduced C. jejuni counts on chicken breast fillets with 200 and 400 mg/kg treatments. Lauric arginate at 400 mg/L gave a maximum reduction of ~1.5 log cfu/g of C. jejuni during 7 d of storage at 4°C without any change in pH of meat. Treating chicken breast fillets with 400 mg/kg of LAE caused 2.3 log cfu/g reduction of psychrotrophs (P ≤ 0.05) compared with the control on d 0 of storage. However, no difference existed (P ≥ 0.05) in the growth of psychrotrophs on chicken breast fillets after treatment with 200 and 400 mg/kg of LAE compared with the control after 3 d. The LAE treatments had no effect (P ≥ 0.05) on growth of mesophilic organisms. The results of the study indicated that LAE is effective in reducing C. jejuni on chicken breast fillets.