TITLE:
Modelling Bacterial Dynamics in Food Products: Role of Environmental Noise and Interspecific Competition
AUTHORS:
Davide Valenti, Alessandro Giuffrida, Graziella, Ziino, Filippo Giarratana, Bernardo Spagnolo, Antonio Panebianco
KEYWORDS:
Statistical Mechanics; Population Dynamics; Noise-Induced Effects; Stochastic Modeling; Noise in Biological Systems
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Modern Physics,
Vol.4 No.8,
August
13,
2013
ABSTRACT: In this paper we review some results obtained within the context of
the predictive microbiology, which is a specific field of the population
dynamics. In particular we discuss three models, which exploit tools of
statistical mechanics, for bacterial dynamics in food of animal origin. In the
first model, the random fluctuating behaviour, experimentally measured, of the
temperature is considered. In the second model stochastic differential equations
are introduced to take into account the influence of physical and chemical
variables, such as temperature, pH and activity water, subject to deterministic
and random variations. The third model, which is an extended version of the
second one, neglects the environmental fluctuations, and concentrates on the
role of the interspecific bacterial interactions. The comparison between
expected results and observed data indicates that the presence of noise sources
and interspecific bacterial interactions improves the predictive features of
the models analyzed.