Prediction of growth kinetics of Pseudomonas spp. in meat products under isothermal and non-isothermal storage conditions

Abstract

The main objective of the present study was to develop and validate a new alternative modelling method to predict the shelf-life of food products under non-isothermal storage conditions. The bacterial growth data of the Pseudomonas spp. was extracted from published studies conducted for aerobically-stored fish, pork and chicken meat and described with two-step and one-step modelling approaches employing different primary models (the modified Gompertz, logistic, Baranyi and Huang models) under isothermal storage temperatures. Temperature dependent kinetic parameters (maximum specific growth rate ‘µmax’ and lag phase duration ‘λ’) were described as a function of storage temperature via the Ratkowsky model integrated with each primary model. The Huang model based on the one-step modelling approach yielded the best goodness of fit results (RMSE = 0.451 and adjusted-R2 = 0.942) for all food products at isothermal storage conditions, therefore, was also used to check it’s the prediction capability under non-isothermal storage conditions. The differential form of the Huang model provided satisfactorily statistical indexes (1.075 > Bf > 1.014 and 1.080 > Af > 1.047) indicating reliably being able to use to describe the growth behaviour of Pseudomonas spp. in fish, pork and chicken meat subjected to non-isothermal storage conditions.