MicroVal Certification for 24 Hour Total Aerobic Plate Count Method

The SimPlate® Total Plate Count Color Indicator (TPC-CI) from BioControl Systems has been granted MicroVal Certificate 2009LR26.

SimPlate TPC-CI is a rapid method for quantifying total aerobic plate counts from food samples in only 24 hours. Developed to overcome the limitations of other counting procedures such as agar plates and film methods, SimPlate consists of proprietary formulations of pre-measured media and a patented plating device.

SimPlate uses patented Binary Detection Technology™ which produces an easily interpreted color change. The isolation wells on the SimPlate device are used to confine these color reactions, allowing technicians to simply count the number of positive wells to determine the aerobic plate count of a sample. 'While other common agar and film plating methods require duplicate plating of multiple dilutions of samples, SimPlate's expanded counting range of up to 738 cfu's eliminates these extraneous steps', according to Tara Staten, BioControl Product Manager. 'The device's unique isolation wells provide an ease of counting, not found in other plating methods' says Staten, 'and prevent interference from sample particulates, ensuring accuracy and saving labs both time and money'.

Rapid methods such as SimPlate can offer dramatic financial benefits to food processors, allowing them to release product days earlier than with conventional methods. The reference culture method for aerobic plate counts provides results in 48 hours while SimPlate results are available in just 24 hours.

SimPlate TPC-CI has also been approved as AOAC Official Method of Analysis 2002.07 and is one of several products in the SimPlate product line which includes SimPlate Yeast & Mold Color Indicator (MicroVal Certificate No. 2009LR25 / AOAC Official Method 2002.11), SimPlate Coliform/E. coli Color Indicator (AOAC Official Method 2005.03), SimPlate Enterobacteriaceae and SimPlate Campylobacter.