ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on different formats available for the detection of pathogens in foods. It aims to cover different methods employed for the generation of probe biomolecules used in developing biosensors. Potential pathogens causing foodborne illnesses include: Campylobacter, Salmonella, Listeria monocytogenes, and Escherichia coli O157:H7. Classical culture-based method is the oldest bacterial detection technique and remains the standard detection methodology. Although, the immunoassays, based upon the antigen-antibody interactions are established techniques, they often lack specificity. The Polymerase chain reaction and Quantitative real time polymerase chain reactions are powerful molecular techniques frequently used to amplify the desired gene sequence. Nucleic acid microarray technology is fabricated on the ability of nucleic acids and complementary sequences to hybridize effectively to their target sequences. Gold nanoparticles (GNP) -based DNA detection has high sensitivity as compared to conventional fluorescence based assays due to the extremely high molar absorptivity of GNPs.
