Improvement of new logistic model for bacterial growth.

Recently Fujikawa et al. [J. Food Hyg. Soc. Japan, 44, 155-160 (2003)] developed a new logistic model for bacterial growth. In the present study, an adjustment factor in the model was improved. The improved model could successfully describe growth curves of Escherichia coli and Salmonella in liquid media. In particular, the model could describe the linear growth at the early logarithmic phase more accurately than the previous model, being similar in this respect to the Baranyi model. However, the improved model more accurately predicted the rate constant of growth and the duration of the lag time as compared with the Baranyi model. These results showed that the improved model has the potential to successfully predict microbial growth.