Bacterial diversity and microbiological risk analysis for the ready-to-eat meat products in China

The global popularity of ready-to-eat (RTE) meat products continues to rise due to their convenience; however, this trend also brings potential risks, since RTE meat products can be susceptible to microbial contaminations by various foodborne pathogens or spoilage bacteria. This study is focused on comprehensively investigating the bacterial contamination of RTE meat products in Yangzhou, China with both cultivable and high-throughput sequencing (HTS) approaches. In addition, risk-related phenotypes of the strains in RTE meat products, including biofilm formation, bacterial motility, and spoilage enzyme production, were also explored. Results showed that 90 strains collected from 25 RTE samples belonged to 20 and 50 different genera and species. The genus of Bacillus was the most dominant, accounting for 40% of total isolates, followed by Salmonella (10%), Pseudomonas (10%), and Staphylococcus (7.8%). HTS analysis revealed a markedly distinct bacterial population, with Streptococcus and Acinetobacter being most dominant in RTE meat products. Most of the meat-derived strains were identified as strong biofilm formers with high swarming (0.87–5.35 cm) and swimming (0.88–7.89 cm) activity, and had good capacity to produce proteases (0.88–4.87 A/h·mL at 28 ℃, and 0.82–1.21 A/h·mL at 7 ℃) and lipases (4.25–83.12 nmol/min·mL at 28 ℃, and 6.28–45.93 nmol/min·mL at 7 ℃). This work offers novel insights into the potential microbiological risks of strains in RTE meat products, and further promotes the development of advanced methods for RTE meat product preservation.