Professors at Florida State University have been awarded grants to conduct research on projects involving food safety.

The grants, totaling $300,000, were awarded by the USDA's National Institute of Food and Agriculture to assist with research into artificial intelligence and food safety.

The grants were awarded to two professors from the university's College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences.

Hailey Kuang, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Measurement and Statistics in the Department of Education Psychology and FSU's Learning Systems Institute,

Received $150,000 for a project that addresses global food safety challenges. Kuang will focus on mitigating the rise of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) by developing an AI-powered, portable sensor that can rapidly detect resistant pathogens in the food supply.

Kuang's work uses meat and fresh produce as models. Kuang aims to create a device that can assist users with AMR testing, training, and machine learning (ML) algorithms to identify AMR and validate the performance of ML sensors for AMR detection. According to the university, the project has the potential to culminate in an education program for future food safety leaders, equipping students with innovative AI, sensing techniques, and expertise for combatting foodborne AMR.

Prashant Singh, Ph. D., an Associate Professor of Health, Nutrition, and Food Science, is also receiving a $150,000 grant. He aims to develop a digital polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test for quantifying Salmonella in beef samples.

At present, there are only three commercially available options for testing Salmonella amounts in food samples, which suffer from reproducibility issues and complicated DNA isolation protocols. Dr. Singh says his assay addresses these issues, and the grant will help create a workflow that can be expanded to food commodities beyond ground beef.

With the development of a standardized testing method, Singh hopes his assay will serve a wide user base, including food processors of all sizes, federal and third-party testing laboratories, and academia.