Radicidation

Radicidation is a specific case of food irradiation where the dose of ionizing radiation applied to the food is sufficient to reduce the number of viable specific non-spore-forming pathogenic bacteria to such a level that none are detectable when the treated food is examined by any recognized method. The required dose is in the range of 2 - 8 kGy. The term may also be applied to the destruction of parasites such as tapeworm and trichina in meat, in which case the required dose is in the range of 0.1 - 1 kGy. When the process is used specifically for destroying enteropathogenic and enterotoxinogenic organisms belonging to the genus Salmonella, it is referred to as Salmonella radicidation.