Thermal inactivation kinetics of seven genera of vegetative bacterial pathogens common to the food chain are similar after adjusting for effects of water activity, sugar content and pH

Abstract A predictive model was made for the logarithm (logD) of the thermal decimal reduction time of Salmonella enterica (D = time to 90% reduction by inactivation). The model was fitted with multiple linear regression from 521 logD-values reported in literature for laboratory media and foods highly varying in water activity and pH. The single regression model with temperature as the only variable had a high residual standard error (RSE) of 0.883 logD and no predictive value (fraction of variance explained (R2)