Electrolyzed water

Electrolyzed oxidizing water (EO) is one of the emerging environment friendly antimicrobial treatments. EO water has been successfully used to control Salmonella, Listeria monocytogenies and E. coli O157:H7 on various vegetables, fish and seafoods, poultry and eggs. EO water could be an answer to the need for new effective interventions in beef processing. Non-O157 shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) are one of the most important emerging groups of food borne pathogens in the recent times. To maximize antimicrobial intervention's efficiency and minimize the complexity involved in testing individual STEC, scientists need to understand which serotype is the most resistant to EO water treatment so if a proposed intervention can successfully reduce the level of most resistant STEC then it can be assured that other STEC are also eliminated. UGA food scientists tested the resistance of 32 strains of Escherichia coli O157:H7 and six major serotypes of non-O157 shiga toxin-producing E. coli (STEC) plus E. coli O104:H4 against electrolyzed oxidizing water using two methods. The results indicate that different strains of same serotype can differ in their resistance toward an intervention. In addition, EO water treatment that reduces E. coli O157:H7 can equally, if not more effectively, reduce other non-O157 STEC tested.