In New York, IBM and Cornell University are using next-generation sequencing combined with bioinformatics to help reduce the chances that the global milk supply is compromised. Cornell is the newest academic institution to join the Consortium for Sequencing the Food Supply Chain, a food safety initiative that includes IBM Research, Mars, Incorporated and Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc.
Normally, raw milk samples are tested for a few specific groups of bacteria; however, the Consortium is using the community of microbes or bacteria known as the microbiome to characterize the food samples at an unprecedented resolution. This data collection will form a raw milk baseline and be used to expand existing Consortium bioinformatic analytical tools.
The research project will collect genetic data from the microbiome of raw milk samples at Cornell’s Dairy Processing Plant and farm in Ithaca, N.Y. The facility represents the full dairy supply chain – from farm to processing to consumer.