When performing quantitative microbiological exposure
assessment, we need to quantitatively evaluate the likely intake of
microbiological hazards when eating foods. This estimation
depends on two parameters: the likelihood and level of the pathogen
in the food and the quantity of ingested food. To estimate the
levels of foodborne pathogens present in foods, models are used
describing the microbial concentration changes throughout the
food chain. This requires the modeling of growth and inactivation of
microorganisms which is referred as predictive microbiology to
evaluate the effects of important processing steps modulating the
exposure: heat destruction of spores and vegetative cells, germination
and outgrowth of spores and growth of vegetative cells
during storage steps.