By Cyril Ibe

In photo to the right: Movers load one of 150 boxes of equipment and materials for CSU's food safety lab they moved from the main campus to a temporary, leased space at Wright State University. Photo by Land-Grant Communications.

View a photo gallery.

Central State University’s food microbiology safety and plant pathology lab has been relocated to a temporary, leased space at Wright State University since July 2.

The new 3,000-square-foot space for Robert Korir, Ph.D., CSU food safety research assistant professor, is in Wright State’s Brehm, mathematics and microbiology department building.

On the morning of July 2, movers hauled 150 boxes of a long list of items, including microbiological and shaker incubators, walk-in coolers, ultra-low-temperature freezers, biosafety cabinets, spectrometers, autoclave, centrifuges, and automated media preparators and dispensers, – to name only a few -- spending hours to get the boxes from one university to another.

The space will feature a staff office and student workroom, three microbiology standard lab rooms including sample processing room, clean-sterile room, and a culture room for isolation and growth of microorganisms.

“I am delighted that this lab space is available now, as this is a good opportunity for me to start conducting my research experiments for our current food safety projects while waiting for the CSU research complex building completion,” Korir said.

“My plan is to stay in the lab (at Wright State) for about one to one-and-half years, depending on when the new CSU research complex building is going to be completed,” Korir added.

Construction began last fall on a new, $40 million facility to serve as Central State University's Research and Demonstration Complex, expected to be completed in three phases through summer 2025. The two-level, 40,000-square-foot will include, among other features, a "precision" lab for both sustainable agricultural and robotic research; a food safety lab; a molecular biology and tissue culture lab; and a soil and water testing research lab.

Korir needed more lab space but could not have it until completion of the new research building.

His food safety lab focuses research in the following areas:

• Evaluating aquaponics production systems practices and food safety associated risks, especially the microbiological quality of specialty crops.
• Evaluating climate-smart practices and technologies’ impact on manure application and fresh produce microbiological quality.
• Prevalence and characterization of human pathogenic bacteria contamination in food; Salmonella species, Escherichia coli species, Listeria monocytogenes, Staphylococcus aureus, Shigella. 

Korir’s plant pathology research includes plant disease management.

“We will be evaluating and identifying the diversity of the common spoilage fungi contamination on local specialty fresh produce and understand their association with human pathogenic bacteria survival and contamination (fungal-bacterial-plant-cultivar interactions study).”

The food safety lab also aims to develop effective diagnostic techniques for both plant and human pathogens contamination in fresh produce during pre- and post-harvest.

Among planned lab services, Korir is considering:

•   Providing microbiological quality testing services for irrigation and food processing water, and environmental monitoring in farms and food processing plants.

Korir sees the temporary relocation from the CSU main campus as a necessary but advantageous move for now. “I would like to give credit by thanking both Mr. Mark Taylor (CSU facilities and capital assets manager) and Dr. Kuti (former Director of CSU 1890 Land-Grant Programs) for their assistance and for facilitating the lab lease.”