Strawberries are often consumed fresh or only receive minimal processing, inducing a significant health risk to the consumer if contamination occurs anywhere from farm to fork. Outbreaks of foodborne illness associated with strawberries often involve a broad range of microbiological agents, from viruses (human norovirus) to bacteria (Salmonella spp. and Listeria monocytogenes). The addition of sanitizers to water washes is one of the most commonly studied strategies to remove or inactivate pathogens on berries as well as avoid cross contamination due to reuse of process wash water. The risk posed with the safety issues of by-products from chlorine disinfection in the fruit industry has led to a search for alternative sanitizers. We evaluated the applicability of different chemical sanitizers (peracetic acid (PA), hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂), citric acid (CA), lactic acid (LA) and acetic acid (AA)) for the inactivation of S. enterica, L. monocytogenes and murine norovirus (MNV-1) on strawberries. A control treatment with chlorine (NaClO) (100 ppm) was included. For each sanitizer, different doses (40, 80 and 120 ppm for PA and 1, 2.5 and 5% for H₂O₂, LA, AA and CA) and time (2 and 5 min) were studied in order to optimize the decontamination washing step. The best concentrations were 80 ppm for PA, 5% for H₂O₂ and 2.5% for organic acids (LA, AA and CA) after 2 min treatment. Results indicate that the sanitizers selected may be a feasible alternative to chlorine (100 ppm) for removing selected pathogenic microorganisms (P > 0.05), with reductions about ≥2 log for bacterial strains and ≥ 1.7 log for MNV-1. As the washing water may also increase the microbial counts by cross-contamination, we observed that no pathogenic bacteria were found in wash water after 5% H₂O₂ and 80 ppm PA after 2 min treatment. On the other hand, we also reported reductions about total aerobic mesophyll (TAM) (0.0–1.4 log CFU/g) and molds and yeasts (M&Y) (0.3–1.8 log CFU/g) with all alternative sanitizers tested. Strawberries treated did not shown significant differences about physio-chemical parameters compared to the untreated samples (initial). For this study, the optimal sanitizer selected was PA, due to the low concentration and cost needed and its microbiocidal effect in wash water and fruit. Notwithstanding the results obtained, the effect of PA in combination with other non-thermal technologies such as water-assisted ultraviolet (UV-C) light should be studied in future research to improve the disinfection of strawberries.

草莓通常是新鲜食用或仅需很少的加工，如果从农场到餐桌的任何地方发生污染，都会给消费者带来重大的健康风险。与草莓有关的食源性疾病暴发通常涉及多种微生物，从病毒（人类诺如病毒）到细菌（沙门氏菌和单核细胞增生李斯特菌））。在水洗过程中添加消毒剂是去除或灭活浆果上病原体以及避免由于重复使用过程洗涤水而造成的交叉污染的最常研究的策略之一。水果行业中氯消毒副产品的安全性问题带来的风险促使人们寻找替代消毒剂。我们评估了不同化学消毒剂（过氧乙酸（PA），过氧化氢（H ₂ O ₂），柠檬酸（CA），乳酸（LA）和乙酸（AA））对于肠炎沙门氏菌灭活的适用性，单核细胞增生李斯特菌和草莓中的鼠诺如病毒（MNV-1）。包括用氯（NaClO）（100 ppm）进行的对照处理。对于每种消毒剂，研究了不同的剂量（PA分别为40、80和120 ppm，H ₂ O ₂，LA，AA和CA为1、2.5和5％）和时间（2和5分钟），以优化去污效果。洗涤步骤。处理2分钟后，PA的最佳浓度为80 ppm，H ₂ O ₂为5％，有机酸（LA，AA和CA）为2.5％。结果表明，所选择的消毒剂可能是代替氯（100 ppm）去除某些病原微生物的可行选择（P > 0.05），对于细菌菌株减少约≥2log，对于MNV-1减少约1.7 log。由于洗涤水还可能因交叉污染而增加微生物数量，因此我们观察到在5％H ₂ O ₂后洗涤水中未发现病原细菌。处理2分钟后，PA和80 ppm PA。另一方面，我们还报告了所有测试过的消毒剂的总好氧叶肉（TAM）（0.0–1.4 log CFU / g）和霉菌和酵母菌（M＆Y）（0.3–1.8 log CFU / g）降低。与未经处理的样品（初始）相比，处理过的草莓在理化参数上没有显示出显着差异。对于本研究，由于所需的低浓度和成本以及其在洗涤水和水果中的杀菌作用，因此选择的最佳消毒剂是PA。尽管获得了结果，但在未来的研究中，应结合使用PA与其他非热技术（例如水辅助紫外线（UV-C）光）的效果来改善草莓的消毒效果。