Rotavirus (RV) causes severe gastroenteritis in infants and young children worldwide. Fresh produce has been reported as a source of RV infection during production and harvesting, leading to foodborne illness. Cases of contamination from contact surfaces have also been reported. Therefore, this study applied chemical methods (chlorine dioxide [ClO2], peracetic acid [PAA]), physical methods (gamma irradiation), and a combination of methods (disinfectants + gamma irradiation) to inactivate RV on food contact surfaces (stainless steel) and food (lettuce). Furthermore, the changes in food quality after the combined treatments were assessed. The results of the chemical treatment showed that RV was reduced below the detection limit after treatment for 1 min with 20 ppm ClO2 or 120 ppm PAA in RV suspension. On stainless steel, treatment with 200 ppm ClO2 or 2,000 ppm PAA reduced contaminated RV by more than 4 log. A 5 min treatment with 50 ppm ClO2 or 80 ppm PAA on lettuce reduced the RV by 1.79 and 0.75 log, respectively. Treatment with 4 kGy of gamma irradiation resulted in more than 5 log reduction in suspensions and 3.27 log reduction on food. The sequential treatments, including 30 ppm ClO2 followed by 1.5 kGy gamma irradiation and 80 ppm PAA followed by 1.5 kGy gamma irradiation, showed additional inactivation effects (p < 0.05) compared to each single treatment. No changes in food quality (color difference and texture) were observed after any treatments, suggesting that the combined treatment of both ClO2 and gamma irradiation and PAA and gamma irradiation can be applied in the fresh food industry to reduce RV contamination.
Keywords: Enteric foodborne virus; Food; Inactivation; Sequential treatment; Synergistic effects.
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