Development and application of predictive models for fungal growth as tools to improve quality control in yogurt production.

The effect of storage temperature (0-40 °C) and inoculum size (10¹-10⁵ spores) on the mycelium growth kinetics of 12 fungal species on yogurt were monitored. A cardinal model with inflection (CMI) was used to describe the effect of temperature on the growth rate (μ) and the lag time (λ) of each isolate. Significant differences on the temperature dependence of the mycelium growth between the tested species were observed. Depending on the strain, the estimated minimum, optimum and maximum temperature parameters for μ (T(min), T(opt), T(max)) ranged from -7.6 to 9.6, 19.5 to 37.8 and 29.8 to 46.9 °C, respectively. Only λ was found to be affected by the inoculum size and a linear relation between Ln (λ) and Log (inoculum size) was revealed. The inoculum level did not influence the values of T(min), T(opt) and T(max) for λ. Based on the above observations, the combined effect of inoculum size and temperature on λ was modeled using a modified CMI. The parameter λ(opt) (λ at optimum conditions) was expressed as a function of the inoculum size. Validation studies showed a good performance of the developed models. The application scheme of the models for improving fungi control in yogurt productions is discussed.