Dairy Foods 3

摘要

Industrial Cheddar cheese manufacturing has been accomplished throughthe engineering of equipment and design of manufacturing plants that areintended to improve production efficiency and minimize finished productquality variability. One aspect of cheese quality variability that remainsuncharacterized is the microbial variability in cheese production environmentswithin the context of production schedules. Our aim was to capturethis variability by monitoring daily and facility-specific changes in microbialcommunities throughout the cheese production process. Samplesof in-process product (milk and cheese curd) and environmental swabsfrom the draining-matting conveyor (DMC) and salter belts were collectedfrom 3 Cheddar cheese production facilities over 3 consecutive daysof production at the beginning, middle, and end of the production day.Diversity of the bacterial community, or microbiome, was determined usinghigh throughput 16S rRNA sequencing. Microbial communities werecompared at 3 levels - between replicates, between days at each facility,and between facilities. The extent of facility-to-facility or day-to-dayvariability differed between sampling locations, with facility differencesbeing greater than daily differences in only 2 of the 9 sample locationsconsidered. The relative abundance of dominant and subdominant taxawas also observed to change considerably between days, further illustratingthe importance of repeated sampling in microbiome-based studies.Collectively, this study represents the most thorough investigationto date into the variability of microbial communities within the cheeseproduction environment. These findings will serve as a foundation to supportexperimental design and sampling strategies for further investigationsof the cheese facility microbiome and its impact on cheese quality.