Factors Affecting Growth of Microorganisms Flashcards
(98 cards)
Raw Food Microflora comes from:
- Animals, plants, and people
- Irrigation and wastewater
- manure
- Infected food animal
- Human and animal excrete
- Food handler
- Raw materials
- Flies and pests
- Polluted environment
- Air and water
- Equipment
- Ingredients
Death/Survival contamination depends on:
- Processing conditions (heat, exposure, etc.)
- Sanitation conditions
- Storage conditions
- Composition of foods
- Types of microorganisms
Raw food microflora -> Death/Survival contamination -> Food product microflora
when applied to microbiology, ecology can be defined as “the study of the interactions between the chemical, physical, and structural aspects of a niche and the composition of its specific microbial population”.
- the term “interactions” emphasizes the dynamic complexity of food ecosystems.
Factors that affect how microbes grow in food:
- What’s in the food (intrinsic factors)?
- What’s outside of the food (extrinsic factors)?
- What’s being done to the food (processing factors)?
- What other microbes are doing to the food (microbe factors)?
Intrinsic factors:
- Nutrients in the food substrate
- pH
- water activity or aw
- anti-microbials naturally occurring in the food substrate
- redox potential or Eh
- biological protective structure
Extrinsic factors:
- Temperature during preparation and storage
- Relative humidity of the environment
- Presence and concentration of gases in the environment
- Presence and activities of other microorganisms
Food processing:
- Slicing
- Mixing
- Washing
- Packing
- Pasteurization
- Smoking
- Any type of handling, including addition of additives and preservatives
Other microbes in the food as factor:
- Competition
- Growth rate
- Mutualism
- Antagonism
- Commensalism
- Changes in pH or nutrients or any other intrinsic factor in the food matrix
Which intrinsic factor:
- sources of carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfur, and other elements.
Carbs = CHO
Available nutrients
pH range of most edible foods
pH 4 to pH 8
pH of sodas and most fruit
pH 4
pH of coffee and tomato
pH 5
pH of banana and broccoli
pH 6
pH of distilled water
pH 7
pH of seaweed
pH 8
Foods can be grouped as:
based on pH
- low-acid foods (pH above 5.2)
- medium-acid foods (pH 5.2 - 4.6)
- acid foods (pH 4.6 – 4.0)
- high acid foods (pH below 4.0)
The acid in the foods can be either:
- present naturally (as in fruits)
- produced during fermentation
- added during processing (as in salad dressings)
pH of Egg albumen
> 7.0
pH of milk, ham, bacon, poultry, and fish
7.0 - 6.5
pH of raw beef, vegetables, vacuum-packed meat, and melons
6.5 - 5.3
pH of cottage cheese, fermented vegetables, and fermented meats (summer sausage), and many sauces and soups
5.3 - 4.5
pH of tomatoes, fruits and fruit juices, yogurt, pickles, and sauerkraut
<4.5
- each unit on the pH scale represents a 10-fold difference: a food with a pH of 6 is 10 times more acidic than one with a pH of 7; pH 5.0 is 100 times more acidic.
most foodborne bacteria grow in acidic conditions