Swabbing is the most common technique used for monitoring pathogen contamination on surfaces, determining the sufficiency of the cleaning performance and ensuring the safety of the finished food product. Therefore, the development of swabbing materials is needed to enhance the swab efficiency and ease of use in the food-processing factory. Functionalized cotton swab was developed based on cationic functionalization for improving the sampling of pathogens from surfaces relying on the robust positive charge of the modified swabs to capture the pathogen through electrostatic interaction. The developed swab was fabricated using UV-induced grafting of cationic monomer (2-(methacryloyloxy)ethyl trimethylammonium chloride, METAC) onto the regular cotton swabs. The prepared cationic cotton swabs displayed a persistent positive charge regardless of the pH conditions. Comparing with the regular cotton swab, the cationic swabs demonstrated 150 to 200 % enhancement in the swab performance for both the Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria under any sampling conditions, respectively. Furthermore, the cationic cotton swabs showed at least 4-fold increase in the sampling performance of the bacterial biofilm from the stainless-steel surfaces compared to the cotton swabs. These results illustrate the role of modified swabs in enhancing the sampling of bacteria from contact surfaces and their potential impact on improved monitoring of microbial contamination and verification of surface sanitization.

Scalable functional cationic swabs for improved pathogenic microbes sampling from food contact surfaces

ACS Spring 2022

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.