Alicyclobacillus in industrial water processes 

Despite not being a health threat, the Alicyclobacillus bacterium heavily influence the fruit juice industry, spoiling the product and exposing the producer to consumer backlash as well as losing all the contaminated products.

Where to look out for Alicyclobacillus ?

Process water can contain Alicyclobacillus at various stages of fruit juice production.

Here are the different stages where process water is used in the beverage industry in order to help you identify the windows of risk:

• Step 1 : Fruit washing
  Before entering the manufacturing process, fruits are washed to remove impurities like dirt, pesticides, or treatment residue. The initial washing usually uses process water that can be contaminated with microorganisms.
• Step 2 : Juice extraction
  When fruits are pressed or centrifuged to extract the juice during the extraction process, water is usually used to dilute the concentrate. This step requires high quality water as it is the most sensitive risk window.
• Step 3 : Concentrate dilution
  When juice is made from concentrates, process water is used to dilute the concentrate. Like juice extraction, this stage is particularly sensitive to the Alicyclobacillus bacterium.
• Step 4 : Equipment cleaning
  Water used to clean the equipment used in the fruit juice manufacturing process can contaminate the equipment itself, like machines, pipes and tanks.
• Step 5 : Cooling
  When manufacturing processes generates heat and require cooling equipment to ensure temperature control, many solutions are water-based and can contaminate the products (with steam for example).
• Step 6 : Quality control
  Ensuring the products meets established quality standards requires quality control solutions that are often water based. This last step is the last high-risk window and high-quality process waters is essential to ensure the quality of the product as well as food safety.

The Alicyclobacillus bacterium can survive and multiply in acidic and warm conditions, which are common occurrences in hot water distribution systems as well as food production equipment.

Preventing Alicyclobacillus contamination in process water

Preventing Alicyclobacillus contamination in process water, quality control practices and prevention measures are necessary. While not highly complex, they ask for consistency and precision.

Here are the four key practices to implement in your factories to avoid unnecessary risk:

• Water quality control: Conducting regular tests to detect bacteria presence is a key step to ensure that process water meets required quality standards. A rapid microbiology method can be implemented to simplify these practices greatly, reducing the time needed for results as well as labor time for employees. Diamidex proposes solutions to enhance your quality control with a rapid microbial enumeration method.
• Heat treatment: Pasteurization or thermal sterilization processes are standards in the food industry. They can help eliminate bacterial contaminants, including Alicyclobacillus. However, if not needed they should be avoided. Consistent quality control helps identify the need for such measures.
• Hygiene: Cross-contamination from one batch, or one product, to another is the most common source of Alicyclobacillus contamination. Rigorous hygiene practice can prevent them, practices like frequent cleaning and disinfection of equipment, water pipes and work surfaces. When working with hot water systems one must take precautions against several bacterial and sanitary risks, like the Legionella pneumophila bacteria. (link to Legionella sanitary risks)
• Continuous monitoring: These practices must not be an occasional occurrence, but a continuous monitoring process to detect any potential contamination as soon as it occurs. It is especially true with a bacterium like Alicyclobacillus with risk windows present for the entire production process, from water source to the distribution of the final product.

If you want to know if your production is contaminated with Alicyclobacillus and spoiled by Guaiacol, you should use the IFU MM12 which is the gold standard for Alicyclobacillus and Guaiacol positive contamination. Diamidex’s solutions are dedicated to help you in enhancing Alicyclobacillus enumeration with an easier protocol and faster time to result !

You are now prepared to face the Alicyclobacillus contamination risk and implement safety processes to limit production wastes and other losses.