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Applied and Environmental Microbiology, September 2001, p. 4186-4191, Vol. 67, No. 9
0099-2240/01/$04.00+0   DOI: 10.1128/AEM.67.9.4186-4191.2001
Copyright © 2001, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.

Survival of Clinical and Poultry-Derived Isolates of Campylobacter jejuni at a Low Temperature (4°C)

Kam Fai Chan,¹ Huyen Le Tran,^2, R. Y. Kanenaka,³ and S. Kathariou^1,4,*

Department of Food Science¹ and Graduate Program in Genomics,⁴ North Carolina State University, Raleigh, North Carolina, and Department of Microbiology, University of Hawaii,² and Environmental Microbiology Laboratory, Hawaii State Department of Health,³ Honolulu, Hawaii

Received 27 February 2001/Accepted 6 July 2001

Campylobacter jejuni is a leading cause of bacterial gastroenteritis in humans, and contamination of poultry has been implicated in illness. The bacteria are fastidious in terms of their temperature requirements, being unable to grow below ca. 31°C, but have been found to be physiologically active at lower temperatures and to tolerate exposure to low temperatures in a strain-dependent manner. In this study, 19 field isolates of C. jejuni (10 of clinical and 9 of poultry origin) were studied for their ability to tolerate prolonged exposure to low temperature (4°C). Although substantial variability was found among different strains, clinical isolates tended to be significantly more likely to remain viable following cold exposure than poultry-derived strains. In contrast, the relative degree of tolerance of the bacteria to freezing at 20°C and freeze-thawing was strain specific but independent of strain source (poultry versus clinical) and degree of cold (4°C) tolerance.

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^* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Department of Food Science, North Carolina State University, 339 Schaub Hall, Raleigh, NC 27695. Phone: (919) 513-2075. Fax: (919)515-7124. E-mail: skathar{at}unity.ncsu.edu.

Present address: Xencor, Monrovia, CA 91016.

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Applied and Environmental Microbiology, September 2001, p. 4186-4191, Vol. 67, No. 9
0099-2240/01/$04.00+0   DOI: 10.1128/AEM.67.9.4186-4191.2001
Copyright © 2001, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.

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