Advanced, Integrated Device Technology (AIDTech) for Rapid, Portable Detection of Foodborne Pathogens - from 'Farm to Fork'

Foodborne pathogens such as E. coli pose a massive risk to human health; WHO estimates that 2.2 million deaths per annum are caused by foodborne and waterborne diarrhoeal diseases worldwide, and in the UK one million people are estimated to suffer from foodborne disease each year, costing the economy £2 billion per annum. Detection of pathogens in food is essential to ensure that the food we eat is safe. Detection methods must be:

Rapid - so that food can be processed and shipped quickly
Cheap - to reduce overall food cost
Sensitive - to detect the small numbers of bacteria that could cause disease;
High throughput - allowing testing of multiple food samples; and
Simple - ideally requiring minimal human intervention.

Ideally, we would like to be able to detect pathogens at different stages of the food supply chain, from farm through processing to retailer and home, in order to ensure safety at all stages and thus maintain food security. This project will therefore aim to develop a rapid, cheap and sensitive method to detect foodborne pathogens that can be used at various stages of the food chain, from farm to fork.

The work will focus on developing a novel, portable micro-engineered device technology, based on integrated surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS), for low-cost, sensitive, rapid detection of food pathogens. SERS is an optical method which is able to detect very low concentrations of specific chemicals, so could be used to identify specific bacteria. Lab-on-a-chip optofluidic SERS sensing platforms will be developed and validated for foodborne pathogen detection from food samples.