Food Safety and Consumer Health

Microbiologists in the area of Food Safety and Consumer Health work to ensure that our food and water are safe to consume. They study the close relationship between microbes and agricultural crops and food products and how those microbes inhabit and contaminate foodstuffs. Microbes can be both beneficial to our health, such as probiotics that positively affect our microbiome, or harmful, including viruses, bacteria and fungi that can sicken us directly, or indirectly through contamination of food and water with toxins. Microbiologists in this area also study ways to improve the shelf life of food products. Production of safe crops is critical towards the goal of safely feeding the increasing global population.
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