Kathryn Boor

About

Kathryn Jean Boor is a Professor of Food Processing Microbiology at Cornell University. Her previous research focused on identifying biological factors that affect the transmission of bacteria in food systems, from farm to table. She established the Food Safety Laboratory at Cornell University and directed the Milk Quality Improvement Program; her group published more than 175 peer-reviewed manuscripts. Among her notable discoveries, her team identified seminal evidence linking bacterial environmental stress response with virulence gene expression in the foodborne pathogen, Listeria monocytogenes. Dr. Boor earned a BS in Food Science from Cornell University, an MS in Food Science from the University of Wisconsin, and a PhD in Microbiology from the University of California, Davis. She joined the Cornell Food Science department as an assistant professor in 1994, became its first tenured female faculty member in 2000, and served as department chair from 2007 to 2010. She has held leadership roles including Dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Cornell and Dean of the Graduate School and Vice Provost for Graduate Education. Dr. Boor serves on multiple boards, including Seneca Foods Corporation, International Flavors and Fragrance, and Sarepta Therapeutics, and has served on various national and state committees related to food safety and agricultural research. She is a Fellow of several prestigious organizations, including the American Academy of Microbiology,…

Research topics

• Biology
• Machine Learning
• Computer Science
• Genetics
• Environmental science
• Food science
• Statistics
• Operations management
• Molecular biology
• Engineering

Selected publications

• The Evolving Role of Coliforms As Indicators of Unhygienic Processing Conditions in Dairy Foods

  Frontiers in Microbiology · 2016-09-30 · 211 citations

  reviewOpen access

  Testing for coliforms has a long history in the dairy industry and has helped to identify raw milk and dairy products that may have been exposed to unsanitary conditions. Coliform standards are included in a number of regulatory documents (e.g., the U. S. Food and Drug Administration’s Grade “A” Pasteurized Milk Ordinance). As a consequence, detection above a threshold of members of this method-defined, but diverse, group of bacteria can result in a wide range of regulatory outcomes. Coliforms a…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Scientific Integrity Principles and Best Practices: Recommendations from a Scientific Integrity Consortium

  Science and Engineering Ethics · 2019-02-27 · 170 citations

  articleOpen access

  A Scientific Integrity Consortium developed a set of recommended principles and best practices that can be used broadly across scientific disciplines as a mechanism for consensus on scientific integrity standards and to better equip scientists to operate in a rapidly changing research environment. The two principles that represent the umbrella under which scientific processes should operate are as follows: (1) Foster a culture of integrity in the scientific process. (2) Evidence-based policy int…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Bacillus wiedmannii sp. nov., a psychrotolerant and cytotoxic Bacillus cereus group species isolated from dairy foods and dairy environments

  INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF SYSTEMATIC AND EVOLUTIONARY MICROBIOLOGY · 2016-08-12 · 163 citations

  article

  A facultatively anaerobic, spore-forming Bacillus strain, FSL W8-0169T, collected from raw milk stored in a silo at a dairy powder processing plant in the north-eastern USA was initially identified as a Bacillus cereus group species based on a partial sequence of the rpoB gene and 16S rRNA gene sequence. Analysis of core genome single nucleotide polymorphisms clustered this strain separately from known B. cereus group species. Pairwise average nucleotide identity blast values obtained for FSL W8…

  PublisherDOI

• A 100-Year Review: Microbiology and safety of milk handling

  Journal of Dairy Science · 2017-11-20 · 155 citations

  reviewOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Microbes that may be present in milk can include pathogens, spoilage organisms, organisms that may be conditionally beneficial (e.g., lactic acid bacteria), and those that have not been linked to either beneficial or detrimental effects on product quality or human health. Although milk can contain a full range of organisms classified as microbes (i.e., bacteria, viruses, fungi, and protozoans), with few exceptions (e.g., phages that affect fermentations, fungal spoilage organisms, and, to a less…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Symposium review: Effect of post-pasteurization contamination on fluid milk quality

  Journal of Dairy Science · 2017-11-03 · 104 citations

  reviewOpen access

  Fluid milk quality in the United States has improved steadily over the last 2 decades, in large part due to the reduction in post-pasteurization contamination (PPC). Despite these improvements, some studies suggest that almost 50% of fluid milk still shows evidence of PPC with organisms that are able to grow at 6°C, even though PPC may be much less frequent in some facilities. Several gram-negative bacteria, when introduced as PPC, can grow rapidly at refrigeration temperatures around 6°C and ca…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• NIH Grant R01AI052151

  NIH · $2.7M · 2014

Frequent coauthors

• Ronald Richter

  Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

  144 shared

• Martin Wiedmann

  Cornell University

  129 shared

• Ellen Jordan

  Cornell University

  72 shared

• D.J. Schingoethe

  72 shared

• J.W. Fuquay

  Mississippi State University

  72 shared

• John C. Bruhn

  Mississippi State University

  72 shared

• Harold E. Swaisgood

  72 shared

• David A. Henning

  Michigan State University

  72 shared

Awards & honors

• Research Award in Dairy Foods Processing
• Honorary Doctorate 2016 Harper Adams University, United King…
• Cap Creal Journalism Award for best printed editorial 2015 N…
• Emmett R. Gauhn Memorial Award 2012 New York State Associati…
• David K. Bandler Cheese Industry Award 2011 New York State C…

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