[February News]

QA Professionals on the Move

bioMérieux appointed J. Stan Bailey as director of scientific affairs for the industrial diagnostics business group.

Stephen F. Sundlof moved from director of FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine (CVM) to director of FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN).

Michelle Kelly has been promoted to the position of microbiology laboratory supervisor at Cincinnati-based testing laboratory Q Laboratories.

David Kirkpatrick has been appointed NSF’s corporate retail accounts executive, and John Connelly has been appointed sales and business development manager for NSF’s Food Safety Programs.

Food Safety Net Services recently announced several staff changes. Wendy Warren-Serna was promoted to vice president of technical services. Ray Collins was named laboratory manager for the company’s Dallas-Fort Worth facility. Dustin Morgenroth joined FSNS as the laboratory manager in San Antonio. Karen Watkins was named audit specialist.

Atlanta-based Multivac appointed James Stillinger as its newest regional sales manager handling clients in the food industry.

FSIS Refines E. coli Testing Methods

WASHINGTON — FSIS, in collaboration with USDA’s Agricultural Research Service, has conducted an extensive validation of a more sensitive enrichment broth for Escherichia coli O157:H7 sampling: Modified Tryptone Soya Broth with Novobiocin or Modified Trypticase Soy with Novobiocin (mTSB+n). The broth was found to support more rapid growth of E. coli O157:H7 compared to the broth FSIS laboratories have been using in past years.

This new broth will allow FSIS laboratories greater flexibility in incubation time prior to conducting screening test procedures and, for some samples, allow screening tests to be conducted earlier on the second day of analysis. Based on testing with inoculated samples, FSIS believes the new enrichment procedure may provide increased sensitivity for detection in some samples; therefore, there may be some increase in the number of E. coli O157:H7-positive samples found by FSIS laboratories.

The mTSB+n enrichment broth is cost-effective and used by many laboratories around the world. FSIS began implementing this broth in its laboratories in January.

The Microbiology Laboratory Guidebook (MLG) chapter 5.03 protocol available on the FSIS Web site will be revised and reissued as MLG chapter 5.04 to describe the use of improved enrichment and confirmatory identification procedures.

Additional revisions to the method protocol include: an updated limit of detection and instructions for preparing beef trim/ground beef component subsamples and environmental sponge samples for analysis.

The refined protocol will be posted on the FSIS Web site at www.fsis.usda.gov.

BAX System Real-Time PCR Assay for S. aureus Certified by AOAC-RI

WILMINGTON, Del. — A BAX system assay from DuPont Qualicon that uses real-time PCR to detect Staphylococcus aureus has been certified as Performance Tested Method No. 120701 by the AOAC Research Institute in Gaithersburg, Md.

The AOAC Research Institute is a non-profit international scientific organization that provides an independent, third-party review of test kit performance claims. Food processors that require an AOAC-approved testing method can now use the BAX system assay for quick and reliable detection of S. aureus, a foodborne species that has been implicated in human illness.

As validated on powdered infant formula, the assay’s sensitivity can detect one viable cell in a gram of product. For quality testing in ground beef and soy protein isolates, threshold values also  can be determined by modifying the sample preparation protocol. Results are comparable to traditional culture methods but available next-day, with less than 90 minutes processing time.

“Because even small amounts of toxin from S. aureus can cause food poisoning, processors count on the BAX system for accurate, reliable detection,” said Kevin Huttman, president of DuPont Qualicon. “This approval from AOAC adds value to the BAX system line of certified products, all designed to help food companies protect their products and their brands.”

The automated system uses leading-edge technology, including polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assays, tableted reagents and optimized media, to also detect Salmonella, Listeria, E. coli O157:H7, Enterobacter sakazakii and Campylobacter.

The BAX system has certification and regulatory approvals in the Americas, Asia and Europe.

New Swine Flu Has Avian Flu Genes

AMES, Iowa — Researchers have identified a new strain of swine influenza — H2N3 — that belongs to the group of H2 influenza viruses that last infected humans during the 1957 pandemic. But this new strain has a molecular twist: It is composed of avian and swine influenza genes.

Agricultural Research Service (ARS) veterinarians Juergen Richt, Amy Vincent, Kelly Lager and Phillip Gauger conducted this research with Iowa State University (ISU) visiting scientist Wenjun Ma, ISU veterinarian Bruce Janke and other colleagues at the University of Minnesota and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. The ARS veterinarians work at the agency’s National Animal Disease Center in Ames, Iowa.

The research team studied an unknown pathogen that in 2006 infected two groups of pigs at separate production facilities. Both groups of pigs used water obtained from ponds frequented by migrating waterfowl.

Molecular studies indicated the unknown pathogen was an H2N3 influenza virus that is closely related to an H2N3 strain found in mallard ducks. But this was the first time it had been observed in mammals.

Influenza viruses have eight gene segments, all of which can be swapped between different virus strains. Two of these gene segments code for virus surface proteins that help determine whether an influenza virus is able to infect a specific host and start replicating — the first step in the onset of influenza infection.

In the newly isolated swine H2N3, the avian H2 and N3 gene segments mixed with gene segments from common swine influenza viruses. This exchange — and additional mutations — gave the H2N3 viruses the ability to infect swine. Lab tests confirmed that this strain of H2N3 also could infect mice and ferrets.

These findings provide further evidence that swine have the potential to serve as a “mixing vessel” for influenza viruses carried by birds, pigs and humans. It also supports the need to continue monitoring swine — and livestock workers — for H2-subtype viruses and other influenza strains that might someday threaten swine and human health.

Results of this study were published online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.