Jenny Schelin, born in 1974, is Associate Professor (Docent) at the Division of Applied Microbiology, LTH.

I am originally from Skövde, Sweden, and moved to Umeå 1993 to study biology at Umeå University for 4 years. In 1997 I started my PhD at Umeå Plant Science Center at Umeå University and defended my thesis in December 2002, obtaining a PhD in Plant Physiology and Plant Molecular Biology. My PhD project was to characterize the ubiquitous Clp protease/chaperone protein family in cyanobacteria.

I started to work at Applied Microbiology in 2006 and the research in our group is focused on food safety and food-borne microbial virulence. The two main topics in my research are: 

• stress-regulated virulence mechanisms in foodborne pathogens
• the development of rapid detection methods and sample pre-treatment techniques

We study for example how different components of food such as the salt content, pH or preservatives affect the growth, behavior and virulence of different food-borne pathogens like enterotoxin-producing Staphylococcus aureus. The genetic regulation of enterotoxin expression in food is also investigated and we aim to implement our data in quantitative microbial risk assessment to try to predict the behavior of the bacteria in different environments.

In our group we also implement and improve flotation for food-, animal feed- and crime scene samples. Flotation is a sample pre-treatment technique based on non-destructive buoyant density centrifugation that separates the target cells from the surrounding matrix by their differences in density. In this project flotation has been developed to isolate (1) S. aureus from milk; (2) Salmonella from both swabs and soya feed for animals; (3) metagenomics in soil.

In collaboration with Packaging Logistics, Department of Design Sciences, I am involved in a project where newly developed bio-based packaging materials for improved food safety and sustainability will be evaluated.

I am teaching in various courses; Food Microbiology (KMB023), Microbiology (KMB060) and Molecular and Cell Biology (KMBF01), given at Applied Microbiology and I am course responsible and coordinator for the course Quality and Product Safety, 7,5 credits (KMB031).

I am a member of the working group in Livs- och Läkemedelsportalen (http://www.lth.se/fpp).

Phone-number: +46 (0)46 2220311

E-mail: jenny.schelin@tmb.lth.se