Microbial Interactions & Microbial Ecology

Food & Marine Microbiology

Exciting developments in Food Microbiology has been the availability and application of molecular analyses that have allowed scientists to address microbial food safety questions beyond merely determining whether particular pathogens are in a food. Such global analyses are allowing scientists to ask deeper questions regarding food-borne pathogens and are currently leading the way to ascertaining the genes, proteins, networks, and cellular mechanisms that determine the persistence of strains in foods and other environments, determine why certain strains are more commonly isolated from foods, and determine why certain strains are more pathogenic. Such molecular tools are also making it possible to more fully determine the microflora present in foods along with pathogens, and to assess the effect that the food microbiota has on the death, survival, and pathogenicity of food borne pathogens.