Microbiological assessment of canned meat products with molecular detection of clostridium perfringens toxins

Abstract EN

The current work was planned to evaluate some locally manufactured canned meat products retailed for sale in Alexandria Province microbiologically beside molecular detection of toxins produced by Clostridium perfringens isolated from the examined samples.

To achieve this goal, a total of 100 canned meat samples were randomly collected from different shops and supermarkets.

The collected samples were examined bacteriologically at the laboratory of Food Hygiene Department, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Alexandria University for determination of aerobic plate count and anaerobic plate count as well as isolation and identification of Cl.

perfringens.

The obtained results clarified that aerobic plat count was ranged from 3×103 to 15×104 with a mean value of 2.8×106 ± 0.29×104 while the anaerobic plate count was ranged from 3×10 to 11×102 with a mean value of 2.57 ×102 ± 0.16 ×102.

Also, it was noticed that 27 and 20% of the examined samples failed to comply with Egyptian Standard Specification of canned meat No.

3491 (2005), for aerobic and anaerobic plate counts, respectively.

In addition, the presence of Cl.

perfringens was confirmed by neutralization and dermonecrotic tests.

Finally, PCR assay was employed for determination of the type of toxins produced by Cl.

perfringens.