Frigerio Jessica, Agostinetto Giulia, Galimberti Andrea, De Mattia Fabrizio, Labra Massimo, Bruno Antonia
FEM2-Ambiente, Piazza della Scienza 2, I-20126 Milano, Italy.
Zooplantlab, Department of Biotechnology and Biosciences, University of Milano-Bicocca, Piazza della Scienza 2, I-20126 Milano, Italy.
Food Res Int. 2020 Nov;137:109426. doi: 10.1016/j.foodres.2020.109426. Epub 2020 Jun 10.
Traceability, quality and safety of edible insects are important both for the producers and the consumers. Today, alongside the burst of edible insects in western countries, we are facing a gap of knowledge of insect microbiota associated with the microbial ecosystems of insect-based products. In this context, High-Throughput DNA Sequencing (HTS) techniques can give insight into the carryover of insect microbiota into final food products. In this study, we investigated the microbiota composition of insect-based commercial food products, applying HTS techniques coupled with bioinformatic analysis. The work aimed to analyse the microbiota variability of different categories of some insect-based commercial food products made of A. domesticus (house cricket), T. molitor (mealworm beetle), and A. diaperinus (lesser mealworm or litter beetle), including commercial raw materials and processed food items, purchased via e-commerce from different companies. Our data revealed that samples cluster per insect species based on microbiota profile and preliminary results suggested that a small number of prevalent bacteria formed a "core microbiota" characterizing the products depending on the insect. This microbial signature can be recognized despite the different food processing levels, rearing conditions and selling companies. Furthermore, differences between raw and processed food made of the same insect or similar product produced by different companies was found. These results support the application of HTS analysis for studying the composition of insect-based commercial food products in a wider perspective, for food traceability and food quality control.
可追溯性、食用昆虫的质量和安全性对生产者和消费者而言都很重要。如今，随着西方国家食用昆虫的兴起，我们正面临着与昆虫基产品微生物生态系统相关的昆虫微生物群知识空白。在这种背景下，高通量DNA测序（HTS）技术可以深入了解昆虫微生物群在最终食品中的残留情况。在本研究中，我们应用HTS技术结合生物信息学分析，调查了昆虫基商业食品的微生物群组成。这项工作旨在分析由家蟋蟀、黄粉虫和黑粉虫制成的一些昆虫基商业食品不同类别的微生物群变异性，包括通过电子商务从不同公司购买的商业原材料和加工食品。我们的数据显示，样本根据微生物群概况按昆虫种类聚类，初步结果表明，少数优势细菌形成了取决于昆虫的产品特征性“核心微生物群”。尽管食品加工水平、饲养条件和销售公司不同，但这种微生物特征仍可识别。此外，还发现了由相同昆虫制成的生食和加工食品之间或不同公司生产的类似产品之间的差异。这些结果支持从更广泛的角度应用HTS分析来研究昆虫基商业食品的组成，以实现食品可追溯性和食品质量控制。
