Impiego di "Asterias" nella valutazione della qualità microbica del latte

The Asterias method for the determination of total bacterial count in raw milk involves the dissolution of fat and protein in milk samples, lysis of the somatic cells and staining of the bacteria with a fluorescent dye before scanning by an automated epifluorescent microscope, which converts the results to the number of c.f.u. units/ml. Use of this method for 396 farm bulk tank milk samples in Italy revealed that the method was suitable for the automatic counting of microorganisms in milk ( r = 0.8034), with a repeatability of 0.318. It was concluded that the repeatability and accuracy of the method are similar to those of conventional laboratory methods.