A researcher at Southern Illinois University-Carbondale is working on using artificial intelligence (AI) to detect the deadly pathogen Salmonella before it ever enters the food supply.
Anas Alsobeh, assistant professor of information technology, recently received a $150,000 grant from the USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture to develop an AI-based rapid detection method for finding Salmonella in onions. The system combines microscopic imaging with AI, which compares samples to a large-scale dataset containing images of bacterial microcolonies at early stages of growth.
The technology integrates convolutional neural networks that can automatically detect the presence of the bacteria. The grant also funds hands-on workshops to train stakeholders on using intelligent imaging in food inspection processes.
FoodWorld 