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Research article - Peer-reviewed, 2020

Update of the list of QPS-recommended biological agents intentionally added to food or feed as notified to EFSA 12: suitability of taxonomic units notified to EFSA until March 2020

Koutsoumanis, Kostas; Allende, Ana; Alvarez-Ordonez, Avelino; Bolton, Declan J.; Bover-Cid, Sara; Chemaly, Marianne; Davies, Robert; Hilbert, Friederike; Lindqvist, Roland; Nauta, Maarten; Peixe, Luisa; Ru, Giuseppe; Simmons, Marion; Skandamis, Panagiotis N.; Suffredini, Elisabetta; Cocconcelli, Pier Sandro; Escamez, Pablo Salvador Fernandez; Prieto, Miguel; Querol, Amparo; Suarez, Juan Evaristo;
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Abstract

The qualified presumption of safety (QPS) was developed to provide a generic safety evaluation for biological agents to support EFSA's Scientific Panels. It is based on an assessment of the taxonomic identity, the body of knowledge, safety concerns and antimicrobial resistance. Safety concerns identified for a taxonomic unit (TU) are where possible to be confirmed at strain or product level, reflected by 'qualifications'. No new information was found that would change the previously recommended QPS TUs of the 39 microorganisms notified to EFSA between October 2019 and March 2020, 33 were excluded, including five filamentous fungi, five Escherichia coli, two Enterococcus faecium, two Streptomyces spp. and 19 TUs already evaluated. Six TUs were evaluated. Akkermansia muciniphila was not recommended for QPS status due to safety concerns. Clostridium butyricum was not recommended because some strains contain pathogenicity factors. This TU was excluded for further QPS evaluation. Galdieria sulphuraria and Pseudomonas chlororaphis were also rejected due to a lack of body of knowledge. The QPS status of Corynebacterium ammoniagenes (with the qualification 'for production purposes only') and of Komagataella pastoris (with the qualification 'for enzyme production') was confirmed. In relation to the taxonomic revision of the Lactobacillus genus, previously designated Lactobacillus species will be reassigned to the new species and both the old and new names will be retained in the QPS list. (c) 2020 European Food Safety Authority. EFSA Journal published by John Wiley and Sons Ltd on behalf of European Food Safety Authority.

Keywords

safety; QPS; bacteria; yeast; Akkermansia muciniphila; Clostridium butyricum; Corynebacterium ammoniagenes; Galdieria sulphuraria; Komagataella pastoris; Pseudomonas chlororaphis

Published in

EFSA Journal
2020, Volume: 18, number: 7, article number: 6174

    UKÄ Subject classification

    Food Science

    Publication identifier

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.2903/j.efsa.2020.6174

    Permanent link to this page (URI)

    https://res.slu.se/id/publ/112182