Online Tool Will Yield Pathogenic E. coli Risk Assessments
Center for Produce Safety is funding the development of a user-friendly risk assessment tool to assess the food safety risks of fresh produce production and landscape use.
Although researchers have conducted numerous studies about environmental and geographical influences on potential food safety outbreaks, much of that work is not easily accessible. To that end, Alda Pires, Ph.D., with the University of California, Davis, plans to tap much of that research to power a user-friendly online risk assessment tool for pathogenic E. coli.
Not only does Pires envision it providing customized results based on user-centered information, such as field locations, crops, and farming practices, but the tool will also offer possible mitigation measures. “The goal is for the end-user, the growers, to have something for their own fields or their ranch,” she said. “They want to know what their field risks are under certain conditions.”
Joining her as co-investigators in the CPS-funded project titled, “Developing a user-friendly risk assessment tool to assess the food safety risks of fresh produce production and landscape use,” are Beatriz Martinez-Lopez, Ph.D.; Gabriele Maier, Ph.D.; Erin DiCaprio, Ph.D., all with UC Davis.“This is a very ambitious project, but we expect a practical endpoint for decision-making,” Pires said.
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