نشریه بهداشت مواد غذایی
سال دهم شماره 3 (پیاپی 39، پاییز 1399)

The measurement of harmful substances that may enter the food has particular importance. Pesticides are one of the most important compounds that are wieldy used in agricultural activities. Despite the positive effects of the application of pesticides in agriculture, many pesticides are harmful to the environment and are known or suspected to be toxic to humans. Pyrethroid pesticides are common pesticides used in agricultural and personal care products and due to their high efficiency in controlling different pests they widely used. In the present work, an efficient and reliable microextraction method based on temperature-induced homogeneous liquid-liquid microextraction developed for the extraction of Delthamethrine, Biphenthrine, Permethrin, Cyhalothrin and Cypermethrine pyrethroid pesticides from potato, tomato, lettuce and onion and then its analyses performed using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry method. The optimized method validated with recoveries ranging from 56 to 83%. The limits of detection were in the range of 4.3-9.4 ng mL-1, indicating high repeatability of the proposed method in the extraction and analysis of pyrethroid pesticides. Other advantages of this method include low cost and simplicity, low organic solvents consumption, and short analysis time.

Providing hygiene and safe food in catering has a critical role in protecting consumers from foodborne diseases. This survey aimed to evaluate the level of knowledge, attitudes, and practices of staff in food catering towards safety and hygiene indices. This cross-sectional study was performed by a self-administered questionnaire to evaluate the knowledge, attitudes, and practices of 110 food staff in food catering at the Isfahan University of Medical Science and the University of Isfahan. The average score of knowledge, attitudes, and practices of respondents was 62.96±19.9, 70.8±9.8, and 88.6±5.3, respectively. According to the results, the level of the criteria was desirable. A positive correlation was observed between knowledge, attitudes, and practices, while no correlation was found between attitude and practice. Although the level of knowledge, attitudes, and practices of food staff was desirable, weakness in some hygiene criteria such as controlling foodborne microorganisms and critical temperature, was found. It is recommended to have effective educational intervention in the implementation of safety and hygiene in food catering to prevent the occurring of foodborne diseases.

Sarcocystis is an obligatory intracellular protozoan parasite that can cause digestive disorders in infected patients. This study aimed to determine the incidence of Sarcocystis infection in slaughtered sheep of the Khoy abattoir, Iran. For this, 204 sheep carcasses were examined by visual observation and then further analyzed by digestion method. Based on the results, 5.88% of the studied carcasses were diagnosed with macrocytic observation. In the microscopic examination, 42.65% of the cases were found positive. Data analysis showed a statistically significant difference between contamination rate in different age groups. The occurrence rate increased with age (P < 0.05), while the intensity of infection was independent of the gender. There was also a statistically significant difference between the contamination rate among different muscles (p <0.05). In other words, the highest microcyst contamination observed in skeletal muscles (90.80%). Meanwhile, the lowest microcyst contamination was observed in the heart muscle (29.88%). This study showed the necessity of microscopic observation of the Sarcocystis contamination in the sheep carcasses.

Food labelling plays a major role in the marketing and identification of products. Given the different physical conditions of each person, the nutritional needs of individuals will also be different. In this context, manufacturers must ensure the integrity of the content and labelling of foodstuffs so that they do not confuse consumers and do not compromise their health. The purpose of this study was to determine the accuracy of the labelling information and its compliance with the criteria established by the FDA. In this descriptive-analytical study, the labelling information of 272 dairy products was recorded. Then the information was investigated with documents in the Food and Drug Administration and the general guidelines of food and beverages. The results showed that 45.2% of the samples contained descriptive statements, of which 50.18% were unauthorized. There was 50.55%, 95.6%, 68.4%, 57.5%, defect with the FDA labelling in enrichment foods, probiotic foods, health claims, and nutrition facts label, and 0.36% of the samples claims were invalid. 3.2% of the samples had nutritional claims, and 14% of the samples hadn’t traffic-light nutrition labelling. Food labels are a tool for measuring the health of products and will have a significant role in reducing NCD. This study reveals the need for more and more rigorous monitoring of food labels.

The presence of endocrine-disrupting chemicals in the environment and their adverse effects on human and animal health have attracted much attention in recent years. Estrogens are the most important endocrine disruptors and estrone (E1) and 17β-estradiol (E2) is the strongest of them. This study aimed to optimize the conditions of the removal of E1 and E2hormones in water using ozonation. To evaluate the amount of E1and E2, high-performance liquid chromatography was used. To evaluate the effect of ozonation on the removal of the studied hormones, first, the optimal ozonation conditions in terms of ozone gas concentration, ozonation time, pH, and E1 and E2hormones were calculated. According to the obtained results, ozone concentration of 4 mg / l, duration of 5 minutes, pH of 6, and initial concentration of the solution of E1 and E2hormones up to 10 mg / l had the greatest effect. Eventually, ozonation under optimal conditions eliminated 90% of E1 and 95% of E2. Overall, the results of this study showed that ozonation under optimal conditions is a good way to remove these hormones from water.

Lactic acid bacteria produce bacteriocin as antibacterial protein molecules with diverse genetic origins. Therefore, identifying the bacteriocin class of native lactic acid bacteria could lead to an understanding of the antibacterial function of these peptides. In this study, presence of two subgroup of bacteriocins (IIa and IIb) in native strain of Lactic acid bacteria was investigated. After screening of this strains against two Index microorganisms including Listeria innocua (ATCC 33090), and Escherichia coli (ATCC 1399) by disk diffusion assay, the five strains with highest diameter of growth inhibitory against these index pathogens was selected. The molecular weight of peptides secreted by lactic acid bacteria was estimated by ammonium sulfate precipitation. Upstream and downstream sequences of the bacteriocin structural gene were used to identify bacteriocin-producing lactic isolates in the polymerase chain reaction. The results of SDS - PAGE showed bands with a molecular weight of less than 10 kDa for these strains. Sequencing of the polymerase chain reaction product led to the identification of plnN, plnJK and plnEF gene regions in N isolate and plnJK and plnEF gene regions in M isolate. Therefore, isolates M and N have good potential for use in increasing the quality level of dairy products and animal feed. The multalign results of sequences showed showed that the native strains in Iran are very similar (99%) with Lactobacillus plantarum FQ and ATCC BAA-793 strains. Inhibitory effects against foodborne pathogens can be used if additional experiments are performed to isolate present bacteriocins in M and N native strains.

Vegetables are one of the main categories of the food pyramid and their consumption plays a vital role in the health promotion of the community. On the other hand, the incidence of microbial diseases caused by the consumption of contaminated vegetables has been increasing. The aim of this study was to determine the microbial contamination of different kinds of ready for use packaged vegetables in Mashhad, Iran. For this, a total of 200 vegetable samples were randomly collected from different regions of Mashhad. samples were examined with the standard methods in terms of the aerobic mesophilic bacteria, coliforms, Escherichia coli, mold, and parasitic eggs. Results showed that in 19%, 14%, 8%, 13%, and 3.5% of the samples, the contamination rate of aerobic mesophilic bacteria, coliform, Escherichia coli, mold, and the parasitic eggs was higher than Iranian National Standard limits, respectively. In addition, a total of 31% of the samples were unusable due to excessive microbial contamination. Therefore, producers and consumers should be given the necessary training to use hygienic rules and stricter preventive measuring is also recommended.

Rice is one of the major food commodities for half of the world's population. In Iran, rice is a strategic product that is the main strength of the people after bread, and it is expected this product supplies with appropriate quality and placed in the household basket. In this study, qualitative characteristics, amount of impurities, the concentration of heavy metals (cadmium, arsenic, and lead), microbial growth (mold and yeast), aflatoxin concentration, and pesticides in rice crop in different regions of Mazandaran (three species Tarom, Shiroodi, and Neda), Gilan (three species of Tarom, Ali Kazemi and Hashemi), three samples of organic rice (first crop, second crop and brown), and rice imported from Pakistan (three brands) and Indian rice (two brands) Was examined. The longitudinal range of increase was found to be 6.68-7.62, 7.60-7.62, 6.68-7.62, 6.50-7.00 and 5.80-6.20 mm for Pakistan, Indian, Mazandaran, Gilan and organic cultivars. Indian cultivars A, B, and Gilan (Hashemi) had the lowest, and Pakistani cultivar A had the highest impurities. Most of the perfumes belonged to Gilan (Talesh) and Mazandaran (Tarom). The highest starch gelatinisation and lowest amount of heavy metals were observed in Iranian cultivar samples. According to general estimates, the highest amount of heavy metals was measured in Pakistani rice, followed by Indian and then Iranian rice. The concentration of Aflatoxin in all samples, except for Pakistan samples, was lower than the detection limit. According to the results, the sample of organic rice with the least consumption of pesticides, the minimum amount of heavy metal, microbial and mycotoxin contamination is recommended to ensure public health.