Center for Food Safety Engineering
Welcome from the Center Director
The Center for Food Safety Engineering (CFSE) at Purdue University celebrates our ninth year of partnership with the United States Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service (USDA-ARS) Eastern Regional Research Center (ERRC). Our collaborative efforts continue to advance the detection and control of food-borne pathogens and chemical hazards. This year, the CFSE team generated 25 peer-reviewed research publications and presented 15 talks at national science meetings.
This research report features results and progress from a number of projects. Our multi-disciplinary approach involves development of new technologies to improve detection of bacterial pathogens including Listeria monocytogenes, Escherichia coli O157:H7, Campylobacter spp., and Salmonella spp. Engineers and food scientists are working together on food sample handling; biological target separation and concentration; and different detection platform systems including biosensor development, optical biosensors, cell-based biosensors, microarrays, infrared spectroscopy (including Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy), enzyme-linked immunosorbant assays, polymerase chain reactions, impedance-based microbiology, scanning microscopy, confocal raman microscopy, bioluminescence, DNA/RNA probes, and bioreporter-based chemical sensors.
Our team is making a greater impact internationally. This year, scientists presented their work in China, Hong Kong, Amsterdam, and Sweden. In November, two keynote presentations will be delivered from CFSE scientists at the International Association of Food Protection Meeting in Seoul, South Korea. We also look forward to visiting with guests from Jiao-Tong University in Shanghai, China, at our annual meeting this year.
Many of our technologies are entering the commercialization stage. The research team at Purdue that has developed the BActeria Rapid Detection using Optical scattering Technology (BARDOT) is collaborating with Advanced Bioimaging Systems, LLC to build the sensing units for industrial validation and use. Some of our researchers work with BioVitesse Inc., a biotechnology company that develops, manufactures, and markets automated in-process quality control monitoring systems and solutions for bacterial detection and identification. Most recently, Dr. Bruce Applegate co-founded Intelliphage, a company that develops methods for detecting food-borne pathogenic bacteria.
I continue to be impressed with the collaborative research efforts of Purdue University and USDA-ARS scientists and feel privileged to serve as director of the center. If you are interested in learning more about CFSE, please contact me directly.
