A novel microfluidic mixer-based approach for determining inactivation kinetics of Escherichia coli O157:H7 in chlorine solutions.

Determination of the minimum free chlorine concentration needed to prevent pathogen survival/cross-contamination during produce washing is essential for the development of science-based food safety regulations and practices. Although the trend of chlorine concentration-contact time on pathogen inactivation is generally understood, specific information on chlorine and the kinetics of pathogen inactivation at less than 1.00 s is urgently needed by the produce processing industry. However, conventional approaches to obtain this critical data have been unable to adequately measure very rapid responses. This paper reports our development, fabrication, and test of a novel microfluidic device, and its application to obtain the necessary data on pathogen inactivation by free chlorine in produce wash solution in times as short as 0.10 s. A novel microfluidic mixer with the capability to accurately determine the reaction time and control the chlorine concentration was designed with three inlets for bacterial, chlorine and dechlorinating solutions, and one outlet for effluent collection. The master mold was fabricated on a silicon wafer with microchannels via photopolymerization. Polydimethylsiloxane replicas with patterned microchannels were prototyped via soft lithography. The replicas were further assembled into the micromixer on glass via O2 plasma treatment, and the inlets were connected to a syringe pump for solution delivery. To determine the kinetics of free chlorine on pathogen inactivation, chlorine solutions of varying concentrations were first pumped into the micromixer, together with the addition of bacterial suspension of Escherichia coli O157:H7 through a separate inlet. This was followed by injection of dechlorinating solution to stop the chlorine-pathogen reaction. The effluent was collected and the surviving bacteria cells were enumerated using a modified 'Most Probable Number' method. Free chlorine concentration was determined using a standard colorimetric method. The contact time was experimentally set by adjusting the solution flow rate, and was estimated by computational fluid dynamics modeling. Results showed that 1) pathogen inactivation was significantly affected by free chlorine concentration (P < 0.0001) and subsecond reaction time (P < 0.0001) and their interactions (P < 0.0001); and 2) the current industry practice of using 1.0 mg/L free chlorine will require more than 1.00 s total contact to achieve a 5-log10 reduction in an E. coli O157:H7 population, whereas a 10.0 mg/L free chlorine solution will achieve 5-log10 reduction in as little as 0.25 s. Information obtained from this study will provide critical insight on kinetics of bacterial inactivation for a broad range of sanitizers and produce wash operational conditions, thus facilitating the development and implementation of science-based food safety regulations and practices for improving food safety.