title: Survival strategies of Bacillus spores in food.
abstract: Control of bacterial spores is one of the major problem in the food preservation. Spores of Bacillus genus are commonly present in different environments, including soil and the gut of insects and animals and, as a result, they can be spread to all kind of foods. Due to their high resistance properties, their complete inactivation in food is often impossible without changing the product characteristics. Surviving spores can germinate and grow out to vegetative cells, with the consequent great risk of food spoilage and food poisoning after consumption. Spores have evolved various mechanisms, including phenotypic variability, to protect themselves from a wide range of damage resulting from food preservation treatments. Even if the phenotypic heterogeneity contributes to increase the chances of survival of Bacillus spore to conventional preservation treatments, in some specific instances, an homogeneous response could be the result of a strategy adopted by the spores to increase resistance to those treatments.
authors.affiliation: Department of Food Science, via Sondrio 2/a, University of Udine, 33100 Udine, Italy. mara.stecchini@uniud.it
authors.forename: Mara Lucia
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Stecchini
authors.affiliation: Department of Food Science, via Sondrio 2/a, University of Udine, 33100 Udine, Italy.
authors.forename: Manuela
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Del Torre
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, Physics and Environment, via del Cotonificio 108, University of Udine, 33100 Udine, Italy.
authors.forename: Pierluigi
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Polese
mesh_terms: D001407:Bacillus / Q000502:physiology*; D005516:Food Microbiology; D013171:Spores, Bacterial / Q000502:physiology*