Insights into detection and identification of foodborne pathogens

Foodborne diseases have become a major public health problem worldwide due to the significantly increased incidence of foodborne diseases over the last 20 years. The conventional methods for detecting the foodborne bacterial pathogens present in food are based on culturing the microorganisms on agar plates followed by standard biochemical identifications. Rapid detection methods are more time-efficient, labor-saving, and able to reduce human errors. This chapter examines these rapid detection methods and their applications in four major foodborne bacterial pathogens: Listeria monocytogenes, Vibrio parahaemolyticus, Escherichia coli, and Salmonella detection and along with their advantages and limitations. Nucleic acid-based methods operate by detecting specific DNA or RNA sequences in the target pathogen. The nucleic acid-based methods described are simple polymerase chain reaction (PCR), multiplex polymerase chain reaction (mPCR), real-time/quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR), nucleic acid sequencebased amplification (NASBA), loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP), microarray technology, and next-generation sequencing (NGS).