Meet The Microbiologist - The Scientists Behind The Microbiology

Dr. Kathryn Boor is a professor and chair in the Food Science department at Cornell University, where she’s director of the Food Safety Laboratory - a biosecurity level 2 laboratory that facilitates research on foodborne pathogens.  Her particular research interests lie in the “how” and “why” of pathogens and spoilage microbes in food.  Boor is also the director of the Milk Quality Improvement Program – a program funded by New York state to monitor and make recommendations to improve the quality of milk in the state. When I think about the complicated way dairy products come to be on the shelf in my grocery store – farmers use machinery to extract milk from an animal that lives in a barn or a field; the milk is piped through long tubes to a tank on a truck that conveys the product to a plant that processes and divvies it up; the bottles and packages are put on another truck and carted to the store – it seems like a wonder dairy is ever safe to eat.  But dairy is safe: CDC data indicate that less th