Mechanisms of Salmonella Attachment and Survival on In-Shell Black Peppercorns, Almonds, and Hazelnuts
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UC Irvine UC Irvine Previously Published Works Title Mechanisms of Salmonella Attachment and Survival on In-Shell Black Peppercorns, Almonds, and Hazelnuts. Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/5534264q Authors Li, Ye Salazar, Joelle K He, Yingshu et al. Publication Date 2020 DOI 10.3389/fmicb.2020.582202 Peer reviewed eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California fmicb-11-582202 October 19, 2020 Time: 10:46 # 1 ORIGINAL RESEARCH published: 23 October 2020 doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2020.582202 Mechanisms of Salmonella Attachment and Survival on In-Shell Black Peppercorns, Almonds, and Hazelnuts Ye Li1, Joelle K. Salazar2, Yingshu He1, Prerak Desai3, Steffen Porwollik3, Weiping Chu3, Palma-Salgado Sindy Paola4, Mary Lou Tortorello2, Oscar Juarez5, Hao Feng4, Michael McClelland3* and Wei Zhang1* 1 Department of Food Science and Nutrition, Illinois Institute of Technology, Bedford Park, IL, United States, 2 Division of Food Processing Science and Technology, U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Bedford Park, IL, United States, 3 Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA, United States, 4 Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, United States, 5 Department Edited by: of Biology, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, IL, United States Chrysoula C. Tassou, Institute of Technology of Agricultural Products, Hellenic Agricultural Salmonella enterica subspecies I (ssp 1) is the leading cause of hospitalizations and Organization, Greece deaths due to known bacterial foodborne pathogens in the United States and is Reviewed by: frequently implicated in foodborne disease outbreaks associated with spices and nuts. Agapi Doulgeraki, However, the underlying mechanisms of this association have not been fully elucidated. Institute of Technology of Agricultural ◦ Products, Hellenic Agricultural In this study, we evaluated the influence of storage temperature (4 or 25 C), relative Organization, Greece humidity (20 or 60%), and food surface characteristics on the attachment and survival of Sandeep Tamber, Health Canada, Canada five individual strains representing S. enterica ssp 1 serovars Typhimurium, Montevideo, *Correspondence: Braenderup, Mbandaka, and Enteritidis on raw in-shell black peppercorns, almonds, Michael McClelland and hazelnuts. We observed a direct correlation between the food surface roughness [email protected] and S. enterica ssp 1 attachment, and detected significant inter-strain difference in Wei Zhang [email protected] survival on the shell surface under various storage conditions. A combination of low relative humidity (20%) and ambient storage temperature (25◦C) resulted in the most Specialty section: significant reduction of S. enterica on shell surfaces (p < 0.05). To identify genes This article was submitted to Food Microbiology, potentially associated with S. enterica attachment and survival on shell surfaces, we a section of the journal inoculated a library of 120,000 random transposon insertion mutants of an S. Enteritidis Frontiers in Microbiology strain on almond shells, and screened for mutant survival after 1, 3, 7, and 14 days of Received: 10 July 2020 ◦ Accepted: 27 August 2020 storage at 20% relative humidity and 25 C. Mutants in 155 S. Enteritidis genes which Published: 23 October 2020 are involved in carbohydrate metabolic pathways, aerobic and anaerobic respiration, Citation: inner membrane transport, and glutamine synthesis displayed significant selection on Li Y, Salazar JK, He Y, Desai P, almond shells (p < 0.05). Findings of this study suggest that various food attributes, Porwollik S, Chu W, Paola P-SS, Tortorello ML, Juarez O, Feng H, environmental factors, and an unexpectedly complex metabolic and regulatory network McClelland M and Zhang W (2020) in S. enterica ssp 1 collectively contribute to the bacterial attachment and survival Mechanisms of Salmonella Attachment and Survival on In-Shell on low moisture shell surface, providing new data for the future development of Black Peppercorns, Almonds, knowledge-based intervention strategies. and Hazelnuts. Front. Microbiol. 11:582202. Keywords: Salmonella, low-moisture food, transposon sequencing, interstrain difference, storage condition, doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2020.582202 population dynamics, confocal laser scanning microscopy, gene function analysis Frontiers in Microbiology| www.frontiersin.org 1 October 2020| Volume 11| Article 582202 fmicb-11-582202 October 19, 2020 Time: 10:46 # 2 Li et al. Salmonella Survival on Nuts and Black Peppercorns INTRODUCTION In this study, we assessed the population dynamics of several foodborne outbreak-associated S. enterica serovars on one spice, Salmonella enterica subspecies I serovars have been implicated in i.e., black peppercorns, and two different raw nuts, i.e., almonds a number of multi-state foodborne disease outbreaks associated and hazelnuts, under different storage conditions. We further with nuts and spices in recent decades in the United States. employed electron microscopy and high-throughput sequencing In 2004, serovar Enteritidis was linked to raw almonds in an techniques to explore the physical and molecular mechanisms outbreak in 12 states, leading to 29 cases of infections (Centers that S. enterica uses to attach to and survive on the surface of these for Disease Control Prevention [CDC], 2004). In 2010, 272 cases foods. Findings of this study shed new light on the behavior and of illnesses were reported in an outbreak of S. Montevideo linked physiology of this pathogen on nuts and peppercorns, furthering to black pepper (Centers for Disease Control Prevention [CDC], a better understanding of its dissemination and transmission that 2010). In 2016, pistachios were implicated in an outbreak of results in human foodborne illnesses. S. Montevideo and S. Senftenberg infections, which sickened 11 persons in 9 states (Centers for Disease Control Prevention [CDC], 2018). Other reported salmonellosis outbreaks linked to MATERIALS AND METHODS nuts and nut-associated products included Turkish pine nuts contaminated by S. Enteritidis, nut butter by S. Braenderup, and peanut butter by S. Typhimurium and S. Mbandaka (Scheil Bacterial Strains et al., 1998; Centers for Disease Control Prevention [CDC], 2009, Five bacterial strains representing S. enterica subspecies I 2011, 2014). These foodborne outbreaks highlight the need for a serovars Typhimurium (strain ATCC 19585), Montevideo (strain thorough examination of the mechanisms of S. enterica survival FDA691341), Braenderup (strain ATCC BAA-1739), Mbandaka and persistence on nuts and spices. (strain FDA660151), and Enteritidis (strain ATCC 13076) were Salmonella enterica may contaminate raw nuts and spices used in this study (Table 1). Single colonies of each S. enterica at any stage of the food production process, including stock culture were recovered in Brain Heart Infusion (BHI, Becton Dickinson and Co., Franklin Lakes, NJ) broth at growing, harvesting, handling, processing, packaging, and ◦ storage. Following harvest, nuts and spices may be directly 37 C with shaking at 200 rpm for 24 h. A total of 100 ml cultures were spread onto the surface of BHI agar plates sold as ready-to-eat food without further heat treatment ◦ such as roasting; thus, S. enterica potentially residing on and incubated for 24 h at 37 C. Bacterial cells were then harvested from the BHI agar plates using a spreader and the surfaces may not be eradicated prior to packaging and ◦ retail. Storage temperature and relative humidity (RH) are 1 mL of pre-warmed (37 C) phosphate buffered saline (PBS, considered to be two important environmental factors that pH 7.4), spun down, and re-suspended in 1 mL of PBS. influence S. enterica survival on nut and spice surfaces. Bacterial suspensions were transferred to 15 mL sterile centrifuge Harvested raw nuts are usually stored at an RH between 55 tubes and adjusted to a final concentration of 10–11 log and 60% to ensure quality and to limit mold growth (Codex CFU/mL with PBS prior to inoculation. The initial inoculum Alimentarius, 2014). Ambient storage (25◦C) is often used to level was determined by serial dilution and enumeration on sustain flavor quality but may lead to shortened shelf life of Xylose Lysine Deoxycholate (XLD, Becton Dickinson and raw nuts, compared to storage at 4◦C(Senesi et al., 1996; Co.) agar plates. Bruhn et al., 2010). Once attached to the shells, S. enterica is capable of Food Samples surviving for long periods of time on low water activity Whole black peppercorns, raw in-shell almonds, and raw in- foods, including nuts. For instance, Beuchat and Heaton(1975) shell hazelnuts were selected for this study to assess the demonstrated that S. enterica survive more than 32 weeks attachment and survival of S. enterica. Peppercorn, almond, ◦ at low temperatures (≤ 5 C) on pecans. Blessington et al. and hazelnut samples were purchased from local vendors and (2012) reported that S. enterica survive under ambient storage stored in sterile 500 mL containers at room temperature prior ◦ conditions (23–25 C, 25–35% RH) on walnuts for more than to experimental procedures. The background microbiota on 97 days. Extended survival of S. enterica was also documented the un-inoculated samples was determined to be below 1 by Kimber et al.(2012) on pistachios for at least 12 months log CFU/g prior to our experiments, and remained largely ◦ at various storage temperatures including −19, 4, and 24 C unchanged