Safer Foods – "One Less Thing to Worry About" — Experiences from Food Safety Performance in the U.K.

Nonparametric statistics technique is used in this study.Foodborne infection is a major cause of illness and death worldwide. Regulations able to substantially reduce the number of recalls can improve the safety of the food supply and greatly impact public health. To date, the U.S. has used a voluntary recall system. This is a post-hazard, “repair when needed” strategy, which creates negative externalities upon the broader economy. This study considers an alternative ante-hazard, “prevention” monitoring solution - the Hygiene Assessment System (HAS), in place in the U.K. meat and poultry sector since 1997. This program allocates quantitative, science-based scores to every slaughterhouse /processing plant up to once a month. This poster presents a preliminary analysis of HAS. Statistical and time series assessments of HAS scores at various levels of aggregation (species, plant size, region, etc.) pre- and post-implementation of a HACCP-based regulation (Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point) are conducted. In the U.K., The Meat (HACCP) Regulations (2002) required plants to introduce procedures based on HACCP principles and to undertake microbiological checks in red meat plants. These regulations apply to the operators of licensed fresh meat and poultry slaughterhouses; cutting plants; cold stores; re-packaging and re-wrapping centers. Operators of small and medium sized plants had until June 7, 2003 to comply. With non-parametric statistics method, this poster presents HAS scores differ by plant size, business type (meat/poultry), plant location and pre- and post-HACCP

A Pan-Function Model for the Utilization of Bandwidth Improvement and PAPR Reduction

Aiming at the digital quadrature modulation system, a mathematical Pan-function model of the optimized baseband symbol signals with a symbol length of 4T was established in accordance with the minimum out-band energy radiation criterion. The intersymbol interference (ISI), symbol-correlated characteristics, and attenuation factor were introduced to establish the mathematical Pan-function model. The Pan-function was added to the constraints of boundary conditions, energy of a single baseband symbol signal, and constant-envelope conditions. Baseband symbol signals with the optimum efficient spectrum were obtained by introducing Fourier series and minimizing the Pan-function. The characteristics of the spectrum and peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) of the obtained signals were analyzed and compared with the minimum shift keying (MSK) and quadrature phase-shift keying (QPSK) signals. The obtained signals have the characteristics of a higher spectral roll-off rate, less out-band radiation, and quasi-constant envelope. We simulated the performance of the obtained signals, and the simulation results demonstrate that the method is feasible

Did HAS Scores Impact Economic Incentives? - A Study of Hygiene Scores in the U.K.

Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

Production of human blood group B antigen epitope conjugated protein in Escherichia coli and utilization of the adsorption blood group B antibody

Additional file 1: Table S1. List of constructed plasmids, strains and primers used in the study. Figure S1. MALDI-TOF detection of MBPmut (a) and MBPmut-OPS (b)

Effect of additives and moisture on the fermentation quality and bacterial community of high moisture ear corn

Maize (Zea mays L) is one of the most widely cultivated crops used as energy feeds. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of two lactic acid bacteria additives on the fermentation quality and bacterial community of high moisture ear corn (HMEC) silage at different moisture levels. The study utilized corn kernels and cobs harvested at the stage of complete ripeness as the primary material. The cob was crushed and divided into three treatment groups: an untreated control group (CK), a group treated with a mixture of Lactobacillus plantarum and Lactobacillus brucei (TQ), or a group treated with a mixture of Lactococcus lactis and Lactobacillus brucei (KT). Moisture contents were adjusted to 37.5% (L), 42.5% (M) or 47.5% (H) and then silaged for 180 days. Compared to CK, TQ, and KT elevated the dry matter, crude protein, starch, lactic and acetic acid content of HMEC and reduced the pH, neutral detergent fiber, acid detergent fiber and ammonia nitrogen content (p < 0.05). Even though both additives improved the bacterial community structure after fermentation, KT experienced the greater enhancement. At a phylum and genus level, KT had the higher relative abundance of Firmicutes and Lactobacillus, respectively. Compared with the group of 37.5% (L) moisture content, the 42.5% (M) and 47.5% moisture content (H) group increased lactic acid, acetic acid and ammonia nitrogen concentrations and reduced the pH value (p < 0.05). In conclusion, the addition of TQ and KT at the appropriate moisture content might be helpful for producing high-quality HMEC. Among the three moisture contents, 42.5% (M) moisture content provides the best silage qualities

Assessing Reproducibility of Inherited Variants Detected With Short-Read Whole Genome Sequencing

Background: Reproducible detection of inherited variants with whole genome sequencing (WGS) is vital for the implementation of precision medicine and is a complicated process in which each step affects variant call quality. Systematically assessing reproducibility of inherited variants with WGS and impact of each step in the process is needed for understanding and improving quality of inherited variants from WGS. Results: To dissect the impact of factors involved in detection of inherited variants with WGS, we sequence triplicates of eight DNA samples representing two populations on three short-read sequencing platforms using three library kits in six labs and call variants with 56 combinations of aligners and callers. We find that bioinformatics pipelines (callers and aligners) have a larger impact on variant reproducibility than WGS platform or library preparation. Single-nucleotide variants (SNVs), particularly outside difficult-to-map regions, are more reproducible than small insertions and deletions (indels), which are least reproducible when \u3e 5 bp. Increasing sequencing coverage improves indel reproducibility but has limited impact on SNVs above 30×. Conclusions: Our findings highlight sources of variability in variant detection and the need for improvement of bioinformatics pipelines in the era of precision medicine with WGS

Assessing reproducibility of inherited variants detected with short-read whole genome sequencing

Background: Reproducible detection of inherited variants with whole genome sequencing (WGS) is vital for the implementation of precision medicine and is a complicated process in which each step affects variant call quality. Systematically assessing reproducibility of inherited variants with WGS and impact of each step in the process is needed for understanding and improving quality of inherited variants from WGS. Results: To dissect the impact of factors involved in detection of inherited variants with WGS, we sequence triplicates of eight DNA samples representing two populations on three short-read sequencing platforms using three library kits in six labs and call variants with 56 combinations of aligners and callers. We find that bioinformatics pipelines (callers and aligners) have a larger impact on variant reproducibility than WGS platform or library preparation. Single-nucleotide variants (SNVs), particularly outside difficult-to-map regions, are more reproducible than small insertions and deletions (indels), which are least reproducible when > 5 bp. Increasing sequencing coverage improves indel reproducibility but has limited impact on SNVs above 30x. Conclusions: Our findings highlight sources of variability in variant detection and the need for improvement of bioinformatics pipelines in the era of precision medicine with WGS.Peer reviewe

Optimal Waveform of the Partial-Respond Signal Based on Minimum Out-of-Band Radiation Criterion

This paper presents a novel method designing an optimized waveform with high spectral efficiency based on minimum out-of-band radiation criterion. Introducing the Pan-function model, Fourier series, and constraints, we achieve the numeric solution of the optimized baseband signals. The optimal waveform provides an excellent bandwidth efficiency, and its bit error rate (BER) performance is improved using the minimum cross-correlation function. To verify the proposed model, we present a simulation of the signal modulation and demodulation schemes using MATLAB software. The results are consistent with expected results, verifying the correctness of this method

Scales or Stars? Consumer Preferences for Food Quality Signals

Food quality has become an increasing concern in the public health arena over recent years. Food manufactures and processors hygiene performance plays a crucial part in producing safer food products. While there are inspections assessing plants' hygiene performance, there is little direct communication of performance measures to consumers. This paper uses survey data to determine consumer preferences among a set of four alternative food labels which report such plant level performance scores. How much information, as well as the format they most prefer, is compared using a range of econometric models. Results show that consumers prefer number scheme, larger volume of quality information and are generally consistent with their preference. These findings are mostly continuous across different types of consumers