Harnessing natural antimicrobial peptides to tackle Clostridium in the dairy sector: Breaking the transmission cycle from silage to cheese
Ismail Fliss
Université Laval, Québec, Canada
Clostridium species are ubiquitous throughout dairy production systems, occurring in soil, manure, forage crops, silage, the farm environment, the rumen, and ultimately raw milk. Their ability to form highly resistant spores enables persistence across the entire dairy chain, creating a continuous route of contamination from feed preservation to dairy product manufacture. In silage, the proliferation of undesirable clostridia under conditions such as excess moisture, high buffering capacity, and delayed acidification shifts fermentation toward butyric and proteolytic pathways, resulting in nutrient losses, reduced feed quality, and decreased animal performance. The spores produced during this process can survive storage and transit through the animal, contributing to environmental contamination and entering the milk supply. During cheese ripening, these spores may germinate and produce gas, causing late-blowing defects that compromise product quality and generate substantial economic losses for the dairy industry. Despite the implementation of improved harvesting practices, organic acid additives, and conventional lactic acid bacteria inoculants, effective and consistent control of clostridia remains challenging. Consequently, there is increasing interest in targeted, natural intervention strategies capable of limiting clostridial proliferation throughout the silage-rumen-cheese continuum.
This work provides an integrated assessment of the microbiology, genomics, and functional ecology of dairy-associated Clostridium species, together with the evaluation of antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) as targeted biocontrol agents aimed at reducing clostridial abundance and activity across multiple stages of the production chain.
