Towards microbiological quality assurance in radiation sterilization processing: the limiting case model applied to a microbial population having a distribution of radiation responses.

A limiting case model, developed earlier to provide a conservative estimate of the proportion of non-sterile items (P) in an irradiated population of items contaminated with micro-organisms of a single type, has been extended to include items having organisms of different types. Estimates of P are compared with exact values derived on purely theoretical grounds and with values obtained by computer simulation of microbiological inactivation on items.