Molecular Techniques of Detection and Discrimination of Foodborne Pathogens and Their Toxins

Abstract

The ability to detect foodborne pathogens and their toxins is important in reducing the role that these pathogens play in human disease. In order to ensure the safety of food and thereby to protect the public health, there is an ever-increasing demand from the food industry, the food consumer, and public-health authorities for more rapid methods to detect foodborne pathogens. Along with pathogen detection, the ability to distinguish between individual pathogens and their products is essential for identifying and understanding the sources of pathogens implicated in diseases. Taken together, discriminatory identification and typing methods provide valuable information that allow scientists to further understand how pathogens pass through the food chain and contribute to infection. To help understand the methods available for the detection and discrimination of foodborne pathogens, this chapter provides coverage of methods for rapid pathogen detection, the detection of foodborne toxins, and an examination of methods that can be used to distinguish among foodborne pathogens.