Rapid detection of Escherichia coli contamination in packaged fresh spinach using hyperspectral imaging

A rapid method based on hyperspectral imaging for detection of Escherichia coli contamination in fresh vegetable was developed. E. coli K12 was inoculated into spinach with different initial concentrations. Samples were analyzed using a colony count and a hyperspectroscopic technique. A hyperspectral camera of 400–1000 nm, with a spectral resolution of 5 nm was employed to acquire hyperspectral images of packaged spinach. Reflectance spectra were obtained from various positions on the sample surface and pretreated using Sawitzky–Golay. Chemometrics including principal component analysis (PCA) and artificial neural network (ANN) were then used to analyze the pre-processed data. The PCA was implemented to remove redundant information of the hyperspectral data. The ANN was trained using Bayesian regularization and was capable of correlating hyperspectral data with number of E. coli. Once trained, the ANN was also used to construct a prediction map of all pixel spectra of an image to display the number of E. coli in the sample. The prediction map allowed a rapid and easy interpretation of the hyperspectral data. The results suggested that incorporation of hyperspectral imaging with chemometrics provided a rapid and innovative approach for the detection of E. coli contamination in packaged fresh spinach.