AFRI – FAS Food Safety and Defense (A1332)

Program Area Priority: NIFA requests proposals for basic and applied research that will reduce the risk of intentional or unintentional contamination of foods.

Applications must address one or more of the following (order does not indicate importance):

a. Develop microbiological methods for enumerating enteric pathogens, specifically Salmonella, Campylobacter, and Shiga toxin-producing E. coli (STEC), in large representative food samples designed to represent a food production lot;

b. Develop microbiological procedures designed to alleviate the need for enrichment in the detection of very small numbers of pathogens in large food samples collected to represent a food production lot;

c. Develop methods for identifying, detecting, and/or enumerating pathogens of relatively high public health risk including persistence or virulence;

d. Develop and validate advanced and innovative technologies or processes for food processing, manufacturing, packaging, cleaning, and sanitation to effectively reduce the presence of surviving enteric pathogens in food and processing facilities;

e. Develop preharvest or postharvest methods to detect, reduce, and/or mitigate microbial pathogens, allergens, physical hazards, or toxic chemicals in foods, such as arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury, PFAS, or emerging chemicals of concern such as micro- and nanoplastics) in foods, including specific reference to culturally and contextually appropriate approaches (such as Indigenous Traditional Ecological Knowledge);

f. Develop methods to identify, prevent, or reduce intentional contamination or adulteration of foods; or

g. Develop and validate novel strategies for the effective control of persistent reservoirs of foodborne pathogens.