• Monica Sokta
• Ajay Kumar

Food is consumed to provide nutritional support for the body. Food is a source of nutrients therefore it also provides suitable growth medium to pathogenic organisms for its proliferation as a result food get contaminated which can cause consumer illness. Unsanitary handling of the food by the some of the vendors has been commonly found to be the source of contamination. In the present study from 12 food samples 30 bacterial strains were isolated. Some of the isolates showed characteristic growth/pigment over Nutrient Agar, MacConkey Agar, Bismuth sulphite agar and EMB Agar. Further, biochemical identification showed that isolate OJ was E. coli, isolate PJ was S. aureus, isolate CJ was Salmonella sp. and isolate SJ was P. aeruginosa. Further, antibiotic susceptibility test results showed that minimum zone of inhibition about around 12mm showed by Salmonella sp. against Gentamicin. The isolate S. aureus was found resistant to Aztreonam and Penicillin whereas E. coli isolate was resistant to Cefotaxime and Ampicillin. On the other hand, P. aeruginosa was found resistant to Cefotaxime, Aztreonam and Cefoperazone. Staphylococcus aureus was found Coagulase positive while all other bacteria were Coagulase negative. P. aeruginosa and Salmonella sp. was found positive for proteolytic activity. Only Pseudomonas aeruginosa showed haemolytic activity. So, overall Pseudomonas aeruginosa showed maximum virulent traits alongwith antibiotic resistance. Therefore, it is necessary to monitor microbial community in the different food samples specially pathogenic bacteria by the govt. authority as the presence of pathogenic and multi-drug resistant bacteria may be a cause of epidemic.

Antibiotic resistance, virulence, food safety, E. coli, P. aeruginosa, S. aureus, Salmonella sp.

"Persistence of various food contaminating bacteria in various food samples of Solan city", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.5, Issue 12, page no.429-435, December 2018, Available :http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIREC06051.pdf

"Persistence of various food contaminating bacteria in various food samples of Solan city", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org | UGC and issn Approved), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.5, Issue 12, page no. pp429-435, December 2018, Available at : http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIREC06051.pdf