Sampling/Sample Prep

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QualiTru Sampling Systems has introduced the first of three new products planned for 2023—the new TruStream7 Adjustable Tanker Port with Security Lid, specifically designed for sampling in dairy and other liquid food tanker trucks.

Food safety sampling and testing strategies must seek ways to adapt food safety plans that reflect the reality of contamination to improve hazard detection and ultimately help ensure that food is safe for consumers. One solution is to maximize the power of sampling plans to detect target hazards present at explicitly defined risk levels—prevalence, level, and/or distribution. This would allow food safety professionals to better manage risk in their specific system.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (USDA’s FSIS) will host a virtual open house featuring live demonstrations and presentations on Salmonella sampling and quantification, whole genome sequencing, agency technology, and the National Residue Program.

Agilent and METTLER TOLEDO have announced an integrated solution that features the automatic, seamless transfer of weighing results and associated metadata from METTLER TOLEDO LabX™ Balance software to Agilent OpenLab software.

PerkinElmer has launched its new GC 2400™ Platform, an automated gas chromatography (GC) headspace sampler and GC/mass spectrometry solution for food safety testing laboratories. 

The food industry recognizes that consumers provide a very high level of fitness-for-purpose testing when they use products. Some shrinkage is, of course, involved in this process, but this consumer sampling will always reach beyond what is possible for a manufacturer. Instead, manufacturers make a more careful study of samples that are expected to be representative of what is delivered to the consumer. The selection of these samples, including the common misconceptions around the sampling of leafy greens, is the focus of this article. 

It is critical to understand the data provided by a sampling plan and the related assessments. Inadequate sampling programs can lead to illness and the loss of consumer confidence.

I recall sitting in the office one day in the fall of 2018 when I received a call from a reporter who informed me that there had been a further outbreak of Escherichia coli O157:H7 linked to romaine lettuce. After an initial response of “oh, no,” the reporter asked why do we continue to have outbreaks linked to lettuce?