Justin T Baca
University of New Mexico, USA
Title: Shear horizontal surface acoustic wave sensors for rapid detection of enterohemorrhagic escherichia coli
Biography
Biography: Justin T Baca
Abstract
Foodborn illness effects millions of US residents each year, and enterohemorrhagic E coli accounts for a large proportion of severe disease. Current food screening and testing protocols rely on traditional culture and PCR methods, and may take multiple days to confirm the presence of pathogenic bacteria in food products. We present a rapid, sensitive, reagent-free detection methodology based on a hand-held Surface Acoustic Wave (SAW) sensor platform, which has the potential to greatly shorten the time to detection of pathogenic food contaminants. This SAW biosensor can detect strain-specific enterohemorrhagic E coli at extremely low concentrations and within a few minutes. No added reagents are required, and the sensor opperates in a variety of media including buffered water, growth media, river water, and sewage effluent. This sensing methodology has the potential to disrupt current food screening methods by eleminating the need for relatively lengthy culture and PCR methods. This approach has the potential to greatly reduce the morbidity and mortality from outbreaks of hemorrhagic diarrhea. At the same time, this will save the agricultural industry millions of dollars by preventing or limiting food recalls. Here, we report on the optimization of the SAW biosensor for specific detection of O:157 E coli, and discuss progress in the detection of other important pathogens in foodborn illness.