- Q: What is your current research topic?
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In my research field of food microbiology, I am conducting research into developing testing methods for pathogens that cause food poisoning, devising ways to suppress the growth of food poisoning bacteria, and preventing harm caused by microorganisms.
- Q: What motivated you to start researching this?
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During my doctoral studies, I was researching testing methods for food poisoning bacteria, which led to more collaborations with food companies, where I found and monitored harmful bacteria at food production sites. After that, as we became able to trace bacteria to a certain extent in food manufacturing sites, we started doing more work to somehow suppress the bacteria that still ended up in food. When bacteria get into food, it shortens the expiration date. There is an increasing need for research to prevent products that are originally safe for several months from spoiling in a short period of time, or products that cause customer complaints, and now about 30% of the themes in our laboratory are related to extending expiration dates.
If there are no bacteria, food will not spoil. It is difficult to perfectly clean the production line, and some bacteria may enter during the manufacturing process. Of course, bacteria also enter from the raw materials. For this reason, the food we eat is usually sterilized. This allows the expiration date to be extended to a certain extent before it is sold, but bacteria can still slip through the sterilization, so in that case, the only option is to suppress them. Technology to suppress the growth of bacteria using preservatives and additives is necessary. However, many Japanese consumers do not have a very good image of preservatives, colorings, and additives. The global trend is the same, and in Europe, there is a growing trend called clean labeling, which says that it is better to use only ingredients that are recognizable to everyone on the labels of processed foods. Foods without chemical names are considered good. Therefore, in order to reduce additives, there is a movement to find natural products that suppress the growth of microorganisms. This is also one of the themes of our laboratory. - Q: What is interesting about your research?
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I find research topics through my interactions with various companies, so I am able to output research that addresses areas of relatively high social need. It's exciting when research leads to the improvement of products or industries.
- Q: What are some of the challenges of research?
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Bacteria are very strong. If even one cell gets in, the product will be ruined. So how much should we sterilize? If we sterilize too much, it will no longer taste good. I think it is really difficult to balance taste and safety. Recently, there has been a movement to do something about the primary industry before the raw materials enter food companies. Hygiene management at farms, fishing grounds, and aquaculture sites has not received much attention until now, but if the raw materials are dirty, the lines will become dirty, and if the lines become dirty, we will have to sterilize a lot, and if we sterilize too much, the product will no longer taste good. That's why there is now research going back to the very upstream to make the raw materials cleaner.
It's called farm to table, but the basis of food microbiology research is hygiene management from farm to table. We monitor the production process of raw materials, predict how clean they are, and aim for the ultimate in hygiene management within the factory, including the food that comes in, while also improving the accuracy of testing. If food still becomes dirty, we consider cleaning methods, and we consider various measures from start to finish. - Q: What kind of social impact can you expect from your research?
Please tell me about short-term (1-2 years from now) and long-term (up to 10 years from now) plans.
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In the short term, we are working on developing functional food containers known as active packaging. It may be possible to suppress only the bacteria on the surface of food packaging, and if this can be realized, we hope to be able to extend the shelf life even further and reduce food waste.
In the long term, we are currently researching visualization of aquaculture sites. We are now able to collect various marine data from satellites, such as seawater temperature, chlorophyll content, tidal currents, and air temperature. If we can link microbial data from aquaculture areas with marine big data and use deep learning to understand the causal relationships, we will be able to visualize problems such as what types of bacteria are present in the fish caught and how dangerous they are. Right now, we are focusing on visualization of a limited area of ??the Seto Inland Sea, mainly in Hiroshima Prefecture, but since satellites fly all over the world, we would like to expand the same work globally. - Q: Which SDGs can your research contribute to?
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"Goal 12: Responsible Consumption and Production".
The food industry produces a lot of waste, so we are also involved in reducing food loss. Effective use of waste is also a sub-theme. - Q: What is the significance of conducting research at Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology?
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- Originally, the Department of Food Production Science's main mission was to find ways to preserve fish, the most perishable food ingredient, and to deliver it safely to the dining table. Since then, we have continued to research various processing methods and new ways of making food. Currently, we are directly connected to food companies, and are developing technologies that are needed right now. Most of our graduates also find employment in food companies, and after acquiring knowledge of and handling microorganisms at university, they become personnel in charge of quality assurance and quality control at food companies. In this way, I feel that the mission of the department has been passed down for generations.
- Q: What are your priorities and policies when conducting research?
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- We place importance on "meeting social needs." We also want to ensure that our research does not become stale by producing proper outputs such as papers and conference presentations. If our research becomes stale, talented students will stop coming, so we are always careful to make sure that we receive offers from various places.
- Professor Hajime Takahashi's OA paper is here
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Paper title: Molecular subtyping for source tracking of Escherichia coli using core genome multilocus sequence typing at a food manufacturing plant
Authors and co-authors: Ayaka Nakamura, Hajime Takahashi, Maki Arai, Tomoki Tsuchiya, Shohei Wada, Yuki Fujimoto, Yoshiomi Shimabara, Takashi Kuda, Bon Kimura
Publication date: December 2021
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0261352
