Application of luminescent ATP rapid checks at ready-to-eat foods producing plant

Abstract

Bioluminescent ATP determination has been applied at a ready-to-eat meals producer plant as a screening tool to evaluate the cleaning procedures and identify possible sources of microbial contamination. Luminescent ATP test revealed the risk situations in few minutes, any time it was supposed useful, and on site. All data were confirmed by the plate count method and immediate interventions were undertaken in risk situations, concerning not perfectly cleaned surfaces and cross-contamination between the areas for different types of foods. Various departments have been checked: cold stores, raw food manipulation areas, kitchens, coolers, and packaging areas. Critical situations were revealed in the fresh foods cold storage areas, which were consequently treated by more intensive cleaning procedures, and the raw food manipulation areas, which were physically separated by walls, were more intensively cleaned with exchanges between the various areas strictly regulated. Intervention effectiveness was confirmed by repeated controls using portable ATP assay, since the evaluation of the relationship between CFU and RLU gave good results, with an r² value of 0.83.