BIOS 111 Lecture Notes - Lecture 26: Chlorine Dioxide, Penicillium, Irradiation
Document Summary
Spores are the most resistant form of life. After the mailing of bacillus anthracis through the us mail, the use of electron beams sparked. Can"t autoclave mail so we use electron beams. They use chlorine dioxide gas to sterilize the entire building. We use electron pasteurization to get rid of e. coli o157:h7 in meat. Worked beautifully on e. coli including in packaged food. It"s just an electron beam like an electron microscope. We need high amounts of electrons to kill spores. Low doses of electrons to kill e. coli and insects. Using electron beams to sterilize products has been used routinely for at least 50 years for spices, petri dishes, and pharmaceuticals. Plastic agar plates are sterilized by electron beams. The plastic would melt in an autoclave. Antibiotics have a very specific target that will interfere with that organism"s growth. Antibiotics are produced by other microbes to kill other microbes.
