1. Optimal Cutting Board Disinfectants By Joellie Hernandez

2. Introduction Individuals fail to clean cutting boards properly and/or use damaged cutting boards. If cutting boards are not cleaned well, harmful bacteria can be found which can be ingested through contamination with other foods. Disease Control and Prevention Centers have reported that about 73,000 individuals are affected by E. Coli per year. E. Coli currently accounts for two percent of all cases of diarrhea in the western world.

3. Introduction Continued Animals such as cows, chickens, deer, sheep, and pigs have been found to harbor E. Coli in their intestines. Contamination of meat occurs during the slaughtering process through contact with feces and/or intestines E. Coli infections causes abdominal cramps, dehydration, bloody diarrhea and possibly seizures and coma. The ideal cutting board is a wood board that has a smooth, hard surface I will be testing both smooth and scuffed boards to see what is the best disinfectant. I will try disinfecting with Ajax, Dawn, Palmolive, Vinegar, Lemon and Water.

4. Hypothesis I believe that out of the household cleaners, vinegar will disinfect the cutting boards the best because of its antibacterial qualities; as shown in a study done by Ph. D. Patrick J. bird. Knowing through my research that scuffed boards are bad to keep, I predict that the smooth boards will give the best results.

5. Methods I used a concentration of E. Coli of ten parts water and one part E. Coli The solution was smeared onto the cutting boards and cleaned off with the disinfectants one at a time. Three trials of each solution was made per board type. The bacteria was kept at room temperature and the colonies were counted. This is a picture of what E. Coli looks like

6. Growing E. Coli These are pictures of my experiment… Above are all my agars after experimentation. (Some are in the bags) Above is how I kept my agars at room temperature and free from contamination or disturbance. To the left is a picture of one of my agars after bacterial colony growth. To the left is how I counted the bacterial colonies using this grid. To the left is a picture of one of the cutting boards.

7. Results Page One Vinegar was the best overall cleaner for both smooth and scuffed boards. Lime was the second best cleaner for the smooth boards although it grew the most bacteria on the scuffed board. Surprisingly, water did not grow the most colonies on the scuffed board.

8. Results Page Two From this graph, one can see how much more Palmolive grew colonies than the other soaps. From the scuffed board, Palmolive had almost three times the amount of bacterial colonies than Dawn. Ajax hardly grew any colonies from the smooth board and had a low count for bacterial colonies on the scuffed board.

9. Conclusions When washing cutting boards, one should scrub off any food stuck on them and wash them with hot, soapy water. Make sure you rinse the boards well. Wet or damp cutting boards should never be stored because these are feeding grounds for possible bacteria. Ajax was the best cleaner out of the household and disinfectant soaps. Surprisingly, Palmolive grew the most colonies out of all the substances. There is a big difference between the graphs although Palmolive seems to have been worse than water. That was least expected.

10. Future Studies For the future, this study can give individuals better ideas of how to take care of their kitchen utensils. It would be a remarkable discovery to find a disinfectant that is not harmful to humans although it would kill bacterium. Scientists can go further and see what chemical compounds kill bacteria most effectively.