Ingesting foods contaminated with Bacillus cereus bacteria can lead to nausea, vomiting, abdominal cramps, and diarrhea. Though B. cereus is commonly found in many types of fresh and processed foods, proper cooking, handling, and storage can minimize the risk of contamination. This revised 6-page fact sheet explains how B. cereus is transmitted, what foods it is commonly associated with, the methods used to prevent contamination, and good practices for receiving, handling, processing, and storing food. Written by Keith R. Schneider, Renée Goodrich Schneider, Rachael Silverberg, Ploy Kurdmongkoltham, and Bruna Bertoldi, and published by the Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition, April 2017. FSHN15-06/FS269: Preventing Foodborne Illness: Bacillus cereus (ufl.edu)

The bacterium Clostridium perfringens causes of one of the most common type of foodborne gastroenteritis, often referred to as perfringens food poisoning, in the US (FDA 2012). It is associated with consuming contaminated food that contains great numbers of vegetative cells and spores that will produce toxin inside the intestine. There are two forms of disease caused by C. perfringens: gastroenteritis and enteritis necroticans. The latter disease, also known as pig-bel disease, is not common in the US. It is often associated with contaminated pork (FDA 2012) and can be very severe.

What is a food allergy? A food allergy is a specific immune system reaction that happens after a person consumes what is normally considered a safe food. Food allergies occur more often in children than in adults. Approximately 5-8%of children (aged 4 or under) and about 2% of adults have food allergies (FDA 2016). Allergic reactions to food lead to over 30,000 emergency room visits and 2,000 hospitalizations per year (FDA 2016b; Radke et al. 2016). There are approximately 150 fatalities associated with food allergic reactions in the US annually (FDA 2016).

Background: Pokeweed anti-viral protein (PAP) and lectin are two of the toxic components of pokeweed, Phytolacca americana, suspected of affecting free grazing livestock and small herbivorous animals. Objectives: This research aimed to investigate the antimicrobial activity of the pokeweed extracts against two bacterial strains, the gram negative Escherichia coli and the gram positive Staphylococcus aureus, to investigate the toxicity of the extracts to cells of tobacco, Nicotiana tabacum, callus, and to investigate the presence of selected toxic constituents present in pokeweed. Methodology: Pokeweed plants were identified and brought to the laboratory and separated into roots and leaves. The berries were collected later in the growing season. Aqueous extracts were obtained by homogenizing the plant parts separately in sterile water followed by centrifugation. The supernatants were filter-sterilized and used for bacterial and tobacco callus growth inhibition assays. Total cytoplasmic proteins were also obtained by homogenizing the plant parts separately in protein extraction buffer and centrifuging. The supernatants were investigated for the presence of various toxins suspected of being present in pokeweed, using western blot analyses. Results and Conclusions: Pokeweed constituents possess growth inhibitory effects to gram negative E. coli and to N. tabacum callus but not of the gram positive S. aureus, and that all three plant parts studied were rich in lectin and lectin-like constituents such as PL-A, PL-C, and PL-G. No PL-B was detected in any of the plant extracts.

This seven-page fact sheet discusses the common foodborne pathogen E. coli O157:H7, especially as it concerns food handlers, processors and retailers. Written by Keith R. Schneider, Renée Goodrich Schneider, Ploy Kurdmongkoltham, and Bruna Bertoldi and published by the Food Science and Human Nutrition Department.­http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/fs097 Previous versions: Schneider, Keith, Renée Goodrich-Schneider, Alexandra Chang, and Susanna Richardson. 2013. “Preventing Foodborne Illness: E. Coli O157:H7”. EDIS 2013 (9). https://journals.flvc.org/edis/article/view/121180. Schneider, Keith, Renée Goodrich-Schneider, Michael Hubbard, and Alexandra Chang. 2009. “Preventing Foodborne Illness: E. Coli O157:H7”. EDIS 2009 (10). https://journals.flvc.org/edis/article/view/118205. Schneider, Keith, Renée Goodrich, and Melissa Kirby. 1. “Preventing Foodborne Illness: E. Coli O157:H7”. EDIS 2003 (3). https://journals.flvc.org/edis/article/view/108642.