Feature Channels: Food and Water Safety

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Accounting for immunity can strengthen disease identification and management.

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A professor at Clarkson University is pioneering a new purification process that, if successful, could help millions of people without access to clean water quickly and efficiently purify water to make it safe for drinking and cooking.

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Researchers at Kansas State University in Olathe have found that four out of 10 bulk spices purchased in the Kansas City metro area contain contaminants that include heavy metals, mycotoxins and/or bacteria. Four bulk spices typically associated with salmonella contamination included black pepper, thyme, oregano and turmeric. Cooking bulk spices to at least 160 degrees can kill the bacteria; however, putting bulk spices on already prepared foods could contaminate the foods and lead to foodborne illness.

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Dr. Scott Weese will present on how pet food and treat manufacturing practices play a major role in pathogen control for pets.

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Just in time for grilling season, the Home Food Safety program – a collaboration between the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics and ConAgra Foods – offers healthful grilling advice.

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At the elevated levels of atmospheric CO2 anticipated by around 2050, crops that provide a large share of the global population with most of their dietary zinc and iron will have significantly reduced concentrations of those nutrients, according to a new study led by Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH). Given that an estimated two billion people suffer from zinc and iron deficiencies, resulting in a loss of 63 million life years annually from malnutrition, the reduction in these nutrients represents the most significant health threat ever shown to be associated with climate change.

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Technology capable of sampling water systems to find indicators of fecal matter contamination that are thousandths and even millionths of times smaller than those found by conventional methods is being developed by a team of researchers at Texas A&M University.

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There is nothing better on a hot, summer day than a refreshing dip in a community pool, water park, lake or ocean. However, bacteria and parasites can lurk in all kinds of water and put a real damper on summertime fun unless people practice a few, simple safety tips.

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A group of McMaster researchers has solved the problem of cumbersome, painfully slow water-testing by turning the process upside-down. They have created a way to take the lab to the water, putting potentially life-saving technology into a tiny pill.

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In the United States, approximately 179 million cases of acute diarrhea occur each year, and most of those cases are entirely preventable, a researcher from The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) concluded in a New England Journal of Medicine review article.

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The Institute of Food Technologists (IFT) is pleased to announce that Trace One Inc. has signed on as one of the sponsors of IFT’s Global Food Traceability Center. They will join 16 other partners who all share a common objective to strengthen the global food supply and increase business efficiencies through the use of sound traceability practices.

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Researchers in the Center for Immunity and Inflammation at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School describe a novel hybrid invasion pathway that starts with the host cell eating the Toxoplasma parasite which, in turn, escapes to form its own vacuolar niche. This study has been published by the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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Newly published research shows that the use of antibacterial soaps can reduce the spread of harmful bacteria – that often leads to foodborne illness – more effectively than using non-antibacterial soaps. “This research provides strong evidence that antibacterial soaps are significantly more effective than non-antibacterial soaps in reducing Shigella on the hands and its subsequent transfer to ready-to-eat foods,” the researchers wrote in the Journal of Food Protection.

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A new expert panel report on food security in Northern Canada, has found that food insecurity among northern Aboriginal peoples requires urgent attention in order to mitigate impacts on health and well-being.

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Corralling desperados with names like bacillus and paenibacillus will require ingenuity and an arsenal of weapons. These outlaws aren’t rustling cattle—they’re making milk sour and cheese soft and crumbly. For more than a century, milk has been heated to kill any bacteria or pathogens that can affect consumer health and shorten the shelf life of the product. However, microbes-- known as thermoduric--can survive pasteurization, according to South Dakota State University dairy science professor Sanjeev Anand. The Agricultural Experiment Station researcher has begun developing ways to combat heat-resistant microorganisms, a major challenge for the world’s dairy industry. His work is also supported by the Dairy Research Institute and the Midwest Dairy Food Research Center.

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The complexities and implications of the chemical spill into West Virginia‘s Elk River keep growing, according to a study led by Virginia Tech Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering Andrea Dietrich.

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A new treatment, using microparticles made from chitosan, could help dairy cattle stave off uterine diseases and eventually could help improve food safety for humans.

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Virginia Tech engineers sprung into action when more than 10,000 gallons of a chemical mixture leaked from a storage tank near Charleston, W.Va., and entered a river upstream of a water-treatment plant in January.

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Wastewater used to irrigate farmers' fields may present public health risks to children and others.

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Shale, the source of the United States’ current natural gas boom, could help solve another energy problem: what to do with radioactive waste from nuclear power plants. The unique properties of the sedimentary rock and related clay-rich rocks make it ideal for storing the potentially dangerous spent fuel for millennia, according to a geologist studying possible storage sites. He presented his research today at the 247th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society.

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Sunlight plus a common titanium pigment might be the secret recipe for ridding pharmaceuticals, pesticides and other potentially harmful pollutants from drinking water. Scientists reported today at the 247th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society that they have combined several high-tech components to make an easy-to-use water purifier that could work with the world’s most basic form of energy, sunlight, in a boon for water purification in rural areas or developing countries.

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More than eight tons a month. That’s how much organic material in the form of spent coffee grounds the Austin-based Ground to Ground program diverts from area landfills and makes available to people in the community as compost.

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Through a five-year FDA grant for nearly $500,000, senior microbiologist Seema Das and a team of South Dakota researchers will determine whether a test that detects salmonella in human food can do the same in raw pet food. The first year the test will be validated, and then either adjustments or expansion of the testing will be done in subsequent years. The work will involve multi-lab validation with collaborators at Iowa State, Texas A & M, the University of Minnesota and the New Jersey Department of Agriculture.

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Nobel Laureate Sir John B. Gurdon, DPhil, DSc, FRS, will kick off the largest gathering of toxicologists in the world at the Society of Toxicology Annual Meeting and ToxExpo. The meeting from March 23-27, 2014, will feature almost 170 scientific sessions and 2,900 abstracts.

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Recent developments across the globe have put an increasing focus on the traceability of foods. Complicated supply chains of hundreds of ingredients that are used to make a food product make food product tracing a daunting task. In an effort to better protect public health from foodborne illness outbreaks and recalls, governments across the world are in the process of implementing new regulations around food traceability.

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Although levels of furan—a carcinogen resulting from heat treatment techniques, such as canning and jarring—are far below of what would cause harmful effect as determined by the Federal Drug Administration (FDA), a team of food scientists from Technische University Berlin found that treatment of baby food puree with high pressure thermal sterilization (HPTS) instead of conventional thermal processing showed a reduction of furan. The study is in the current issue of Journal of Food Science published by the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT).

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Lone star tick bites are likely the cause of thousands of cases of severe red meat allergies that are plaguing patients in Southeastern states including Tennessee, North Carolina and Virginia and spreading up the Eastern Seaboard along with the deer population.

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A recent nationwide online survey of U.S. consumers by Kansas State University found that freshness and safety were the most important values consumers placed on buying popular livestock products, including milk, ground beef, beef steak and chicken breast. Consumers felt environmental impact, animal welfare, origin and convenience were least important when making food purchasing decisions.

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• Domoic acid accumulates in seafood and is toxic to the brain • The toxin damages kidneys at concentrations that are 100 times lower than what causes neurological effects.

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Sandia National Laboratories is developing computer models that show how radioactive waste interacts with soil and sediments, shedding light on waste disposal and how to keep contamination away from drinking water.

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The scientists are trying to understand how populations of microorganisms regulate emissions of nitrous oxide from streams and rivers.

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The majority of consumers that eat or buy organic products do not want synthetic antimicrobials or antioxidants added to their foods and prefer a “clean label”. A study in the Journal of Food Science published by the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT) showed that extracts from pecan shells may be effective at protecting meats, such as chicken from listeria growth.

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Today, December 12, JoVE, the Journal of Visualized Experiments, has published an environmental research technique that could turn the age-old task of watering crops into an exact science.

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UF researchers say salmonella is more likely to spread on tomatoes only with certain tomato types and drier weather, and that's a key to curbing produce-associated outbreaks.

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The October online survey reached 510 Florida residents, all 18 or older.

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IFT’s Global Food Traceability Center will bring together key stakeholders in the food system to create the first single, not-for-profit, unbiased scientific entity focused on product tracing. The Center will improve response time to foodborne outbreaks, reduce the scope of recalls, and conduct root-cause analysis to encourage efficient traceability practices, ultimately benefiting both companies and consumers.

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Arizona State University scientists have developed a microfluidic chip that can sort good germs from bad. The team, led by professor Mark A. Hayes, hopes to create handheld, battery-operated devices that could deliver clinical answers in minutes, instead of days.

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Study uses patient-derived stem cells to show that a mutation in the α-synuclein gene causes increased vulnerability to pesticides, leading to Parkinson’s disease.

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Thanksgiving is a time to be grateful, to be with family and friends and to enjoy good food. A Vanderbilt dietitian says that making sure the food you serve is prepared and stored properly can ensure that everyone has a safe and healthy experience.

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Saint Louis University germ expert offers food safety tips for a healthy Thanksgiving dinner.

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Food allergies are on the rise, and so is the likelihood that one or more of your holiday guests may have a food allergy, food intolerance or celiac disease—an autoimmune disorder that reacts to gluten. Keep guests safe this holiday season with tips from the Home Food Safety program, a collaboration between the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics and ConAgra Foods.

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Green muscle disease is a degenerative condition of broiler chickens’ minor pectoral muscles, or tenders, that causes the muscle tissue to bruise. The discolored tissue is not discovered until processing and deboning, and then it must be trimmed and discarded, costing the U.S. poultry industry an estimated $50 million a year in losses. After more than a decade of research a team of poultry scientists at Auburn University has identified a blood enzyme that could give breeders a noninvasive tool to screen birds for susceptibility to the disease.

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Recently, the IOM Food and Nutrition Board convened the public workshop “Potential Health Hazards Associated with Consumption of Caffeine in Food and Dietary Supplements” to discuss potential health impacts stemming from the consumption of caffeine in dietary supplements and conventional foods, alone or in combination with other substances found in products commonly referred to as “energy products”.

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Microbes in tap water are mostly harmless, with a few exceptions. A Virginia Tech research team is investigating four harmful pathogens that have been documented in tap water and suggest a natural, probiotic way to deal with dangerous germs.

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University of Florida researchers find old bulbs work almost as well as newer ones in helping zap bugs. This saves millions of dollars and more mercury from entering waste stream.

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A new analysis by Johns Hopkins University Center for a Livable Future (CLF) finds that the Administration and Congress have acted “regressively” in policymaking on industrial food animal system issues.