Antimicrobial Effect of Cold Ozonated Water Washing on Fresh-Cut Lettuce

Evaluation of ozone efficacy on the reduction of microbial population of fresh cut lettuce (Lactuca sativa) and green bell pepper (Capsicum annuum)

“…Concerning the reduction kinetics of different sanitizing agents our results are also in accordance with those obtained by other investigators. Kim, Kwon, Kwon, Cha, and Jeong (2006) reported reductions about 2.5 log units in the natural microflora of lettuce by the application of 1.5e3.0 ppm ozonated water and these values were comparable with the reductions obtained by 100 ppm chlorine treatment which is five times the concentration we used. In a study of Horvitz and Cantalejo (2008), fresh-cut red peppers were treated with 0.7 ppm gaseous ozone for 1, 3 and 5 min before packing.…”

Potential alternative disinfection methods for organic fresh-cut industry for minimizing water consumption and environmental impact

“…Reductions between 1.5 and 2.5 log cycles were obtained in the natural microbial flora by the application of 1.5-3.0 ppm ozonated water (Kim, Kwon, Kwon, Cha, & Jeong, 2006). These values are comparable with the reductions obtained by 100 ppm chlorine treatment.…”

“…No further increase in the efficacy of ozone treatment was observed above 3 ppm ozone (Koseki & Isobe, 2006). Kim et al (2006) observed about 2 log unit CFU/g reductions in Listeria monocytogenes counts on lettuce by applying 3 ppm ozonated water for 3 min. On the other hand, Yuk et al (2006) reported that ozone did not affect the L. monocytogenes counts in shredded iceberg lettuce even applied at 5 ppm for 5 min, and only reduced the counts of Escherichia coli O157:H7 about 1.1 log cycles.…”

“…Kim et al (2006) found that above 5 ppm, ozonated water damaged the surface texture of the lettuce leaves. Koseki and Isobe (2006) observed a rapid onset of browning on iceberg lettuce treated with 10 ppm ozonated water whereas treatments with 3 and 5 ppm ozonated water caused changes in the a* value similar to the distilled water treatment.…”

Effects of different sanitizing treatments on biofilms and attachment of Escherichia coli and Listeria monocytogenes on green leaf lettuce

“…Ozonated water treatment of fresh-cut vegetables was reported to be an efficient alternative to chlorine in maintaining the microbiological safety and quality of products for a defined period of shelf-life (Akbas & Ö lmez, 2007a;Beltran, Selma, Marin, & Gil, 2005;Kim, Kwon, Kwon, Cha, & Jeong, 2006;Rico, Martin-Diana, Frias, Henehan, & Barry-Ryan, 2006;Wang, Feng, & Luo, 2004). However, there are limited number of studies concerning the effect of various sanitizing treatments on internalized bacterial cells and biofilms formed on the surface of fresh produce.…”