Technical Services

Growth Inhibition Studies: Artificial inoculation of foods with pathogenic or spoilage microorganisms to track outgrowth during product storage; USP 51 antimicrobial effectiveness studies; Antimicrobial ingredient minimum inhibitory concentration studies.

Inactivation Studies: Validation of chemical dip and spray interventions against pathogenic or spoilage microorganisms artificially inoculated onto food product surfaces; Validation of thermal treatment conditions (baking, frying, kettle cooking, blanching) used to provide foodborne pathogen lethality; Determining the efficacy of chemical sanitizers against foodborne pathogens attached to environmental surfaces; Meat fermentation and drying procedure validation studies.

Combination Studies: Determining the effectiveness of inactivation procedures used to provide foodborne pathogen lethality combined with tracking outgrowth during storage.

Inactivation Studies: Using non–pathogenic surrogate microorganisms to validate chemical dip and spray intervention efficacy; Using non–pathogenic surrogate microorganisms to validate thermal treatment conditions (baking, frying, kettle cooking, blanching) used to provide foodborne pathogen lethality.

• Cooler and Retail Display Case Refrigerated Storage Studies: Spoilage microorganism growth; Organoleptic evaluation; Chemical evaluation.
• Highly Controlled Temperature and Humidity Chamber Stability Studies: Spoilage microorganism growth; Organoleptic evaluation; Chemical evaluation.
• Room Temperature Ambient Storage Studies: Spoilage microorganism growth;
• Organoleptic evaluation; Chemical evaluation.
• Accelerated Shelf Life (Q10 Model) Storage Studies: Organoleptic evaluation; Chemical evaluation.

• Thermal Modeling Studies: Collection of thermal lethality device (oven, fryer, roaster etc.) temperature data and modeling to determine foodborne pathogen lethality.
• Environmental Condition Modeling Studies: Collection of environmental condition (temperature, moisture, pH) and indicator organism data and modeling to determine pathogen outgrowth in food plant environments.

• Contamination Sources: Foodborne pathogen harborage investigations; Spoilage organism source investigations; Sanitary dressing procedure evaluations.
• General Assessments: Environmental sampling site assessments; GMP evaluations; Sanitation evaluations.

• AOAC International: Method developer studies; Single laboratory validation studies;
• Collaborative study participation.
• Health Canada: MFHPB validation studies.
• FSNS Internal Method Validations.
• USP Suitability and Preparatory Testing.

• Visual Evaluation: Stereoscope; Microscope.
• Physical Evaluation: Solubility; Magnetic attraction.
• Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrometry: Purity indices; Database matches.

• REP–PCR Subtyping: Gram Positive bacteria; Gram Negative bacteria; Fungi.
• Bacterial Identification: Biochemical identification; 16S rRNA gene sequencing.
• Fungal Identification: Biochemical identification; 18S rRNA gene sequencing.

• Staphylococcal Enterotoxins
• Bacillus cereus Diarrheal Enterotoxin

• Microbiological Proficiency Testing Programs.
• Chemical Proficiency Testing Programs

The IR Biotyper® provides a comprehensive approach for relevant and cost-effective hygiene control by allowing real-time monitoring and source-tracking while still aligning with your routine testing requirements. Routine fingerprinting of collected microbial isolates assists with:

• Compares strains

• Monitoring contamination

• Proactive root cause analysis

• Corrective actions in the cleaning process management

The IR Biotyper® is a quicker and more cost-effective alternative to Whole Genome Sequencing. Clear result reports are provided, applying visualization tools such as dendrogram and distance matrix.