Mars Inc. and IBM Research have teamed up for an ambitious food safety whole-genome sequencing project. The Consortium for Sequencing the Food Supply Chain will study the the microbial ecology of foods and their processing
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Cutting 80 Percent of Pathogen Testing for Produce, USDA Begins Shutdown of MDP
After months of uncertainty over the future of the program, the Agricultural Marketing Service’s Microbiological Data Program, which tests produce for disease-causing pathogens like E. coli O157:H7, Salmonella, and Listeria, has officially gone into shutdown
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FDA Releases Second Edition of the ‘Bad Bug Book’
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition just published the second edition of the Bad Bug Book, which now includes a separate “consumer box” for each chapter to provide
E. Coli Primer: ‘Good, Bad & Deadly’
In an effort to communicate a more complete understanding of E. coli bacteria, the American Academy of Microbiology (AAM) released a colloquium report titled “E. coli: Good, Bad & Deadly” on Tuesday. Focusing
Combating E. Coli: Can a Peptide Block the Bug?
In the wake of May’s European E. coli outbreak, microbiologists worldwide have sped up efforts to prevent a similar disaster from happening again. Among them, a team of collaborators from universities in the U.S. and
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CDC Links Salmonella Outbreak to Lab Work
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Thursday that it is investigating a multistate outbreak of Salmonella Typhimurium infections. A preliminary analysis indicates the outbreak may be the result of exposure in clinical and
USDA Requests Nominations for Microbiological Committee
On Wednesday the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service announced that the agency is now accepting nominations for new members for the National Advisory Committee on Microbiological Criteria for Foods.
FSIS
Food Safety or Bust
Is our food really safe? The plethora of contamination events over the past few years certainly begs the question. The first major contamination event occurred in 1998 when Sara Lee recalled 35 million pounds of