DuPont Develops E.coli Testing System

WILMINGTON - Mar 3/04 - SNS -- DuPont Qualicon's genetics-based diagnostic tool for detecting small quantities of e.coli bacteria in foods has been validated by the AOAC Research Institute as a Performance Tested method for detecting Escherichia coli O157:H7.

DuPont's BAX system can detect the presence of the pathogen, E. coli O157:H7, in raw ground beef, unpasteurized juice, and other foods even when there are as few as 10 organisms in a sample.

"These very low levels are often difficult to detect with traditional culture methods," said the company in a press statement, "especially where E. coli O157:H7 must be distinguished from a high level of competing bacteria."

The AOAC-RI comparison studies validated that the DNA-based BAX system performed as well or better than culture methods on juice, cider and raw ground beef samples. Further, the time-to-result was reduced by half on ground beef enriched with proprietary BAX system media.

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