The objectives of this study were to: 1) determine the HPP D10 of
a large set of genetically diverse STEC inoculated in ground beef; 2)
examine the potential effect of virulence genes (e.g. shiga toxin,
intimin, enterohemolysin) on STEC HPP D10; and 3) identify less
virulent surrogates which could be used in food HPP research.