Conference on Applied Statistics in Agriculture

SHIGA TOXIN-PRODUCING ESCHERICHIA COLI IN MEAT: A PRELIMINARY SIMULATION STUDY ON DETECTION CAPABILITIES FOR THREE SAMPLING METHODS

Contamination by Shiga Toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) is a continuing concern for meat production facility management throughout the United States. Several methods have been used to detect STEC during meat processing, however the excessive experimental cost of determining the optimal method is rarely feasible. The objective of this preliminary simulation study is to determine which sampling method (Cozzini core sampler, core drill shaving, and N-60 surface excision) will better detect STEC at varying levels of contamination present in the meat. 1000 simulated experiments were studied using a binary model for rare occurrences to find the optimal method. We found that for meat contamination levels less than 0.1% or greater than 10% all sampling methods perform equally. At moderate levels of contamination (between 0.1% and 10%) core drill shaving and N-60 perform significantly better than Cozzini core sampler. However, there does not appear to be a significant difference between core drill shaving and N-60. This project was supported by an Agriculture and Food Research Initiative Competitive Grant no. 2012-68003-30155 from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture.