SBIR Phase I: Development of a biological barcode-based method for improved food traceability

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) project is to provide a rapid method to identify the source of contaminated produce. In 2011, the CDC estimated that in the USA 3,000 deaths are caused each year due to foodborne illness. The total annual cost to the U.S. economy, including recalls and other costs exceeds $70 billion. The ability to rapidly and accurately trace the origin of contaminated food is critical because it allows the implementation of targeted measures to prevent recurrences, and also reduces the need for massive and costly recalls that are otherwise necessary to protect public health. In addition, economically motivated food adulteration and fraud are becoming very serious problems and the annual cost to the global food industry is estimated to be $15 billion. In many cases, detection of fraud or adulteration is either impossible or extremely costly or time consuming, and, thus, impractical. Food fraud damages the consumers' trust in the integrity of the food supply and diminishes the ability of producers and retailers to guarantee the purity and to brand or differentiate their products. This SBIR Phase I project proposes to establish the feasibility of developing a biological barcode-based method to rapidly and effectively identify the source of food, and detect fraud or adulteration of liquid goods. Existing food-tracing technologies are generally ineffective because traceability information is printed on the packaging, which is almost always discarded before the product reaches the consumer. Trace back investigations are cumbersome, very time consuming and often inconclusive. Advances in bio-engineering have produced a material that enables the development of a very efficient, effective, and low cost food tracing system. This offers the opportunity to trace food along multiple steps in the supply chain, and ultimately to the consumer by applying the product identification directly on many food products, at a cost significantly lower than any other method. The goal is to demonstrate the feasibility of this method by applying biological markers to trace one food item that has been the cause of outbreaks in recent years. This food will be tracked through the supply chain to demonstrate stability of the tracers, as well as the ability to identify the source of co-mingled products from different origins. This technology also will be used to demonstrate its feasibility for detection of adulteration of olive oil.