J am es Ba rb ar e e
Biological Sciences
Research Update
As many as 76 million Americans become
ill annually due to foodborne pathogens and
toxins. To help combat the problem, Biological
Sciences Professor James Barbaree researches
and develops food sensors that can offer
rapid detection and subtyping of infectious
pathogenic bacteria on food. Typically as small
as a microchip, such devices can prove to be
invaluable in the analysis of containment in food
and waterborne disease outbreaks. For example,
Barbaree is a member of the interdisciplinary
Auburn University Detection and Food Safety
Center, and they created a sensor that can detect
Bacillus anthracis bacterial spores, or anthrax.
The Detection and Food Safety Center was
formed in October 1999, and became an Auburn
University Pinnacle of Excellence Research
group. The team operates under the leadership
of Materials Engineering Professor Bryan
Chin. Barbaree is the center’s associate director.
Colleges represented at the center include
Engineering, COSAM, Agriculture, Human
Sciences, and Veterinary Medicine.
Recently, some members of the center
received a four-year grant from the U.S. Food
and Drug Administration in the amount
of $1,656,405. The title of the grant is
“Magnetoelastic Biosensors for Detection of
Pathogens in Globe Fruits.” Globe fruits such
as tomatoes, cantaloupes, and watermelons can
suffer from Salmonella contamination from a
variety of sources like run-off from heavy rains or
contaminated pond water. To detect Salmonella
contamination of fresh globe fruits, Barbaree,
along with the Auburn University Detection
and Food Safety Center, will work to develop,
demonstrate, and field test an inexpensive,
accurate, easy-to-use biosensor so that critical
hazard sources can be identified.
“My lab grows the bacteriophages and
develops them to bind to specific bacteria. The
engineers in the group develop the platforms
that are integrated with the phage,” Barbaree
said. “When the phage binds with the bacteria,
‘mass loading’ occurs. Mass loading changes the
frequency of the particle in the magnetic field,
and it becomes the signal for the sensor test. This
is radio frequency technology, which is why it’s
important to have the expertise of engineers to
combine with biologists in our research.”
Barbaree also conducts research into the
transmission of diseases in airplane cabins.
His lab is testing several interior cabin
airplane parts, and they test pathogens such as
Escherichia coli O157:H7, Methicillin-resistant
Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), Mycobacterium
smegmatis (a stimulant for tuberculosis), and
Bacillus anthracis.
“We test the pathogens in simulated sweat
and saliva and measure their survivability in
an environment similar to the environment
of an airline cabin, including low humidity.
My lab then assigns a relative risk value to the
organisms. In other words, if I get on an airplane,
what is the risk that one of these pathogens will
get to me? So far, we know that E. coli seems to
survive very well on metal surfaces such as the
door handle to the restroom,” Barbaree said.
This aspect of Barbaree’s research
is conducted with the Airliner Cabin
Environment Research group, or ACER. This
national organization is headquartered at
Auburn University and directed by Materials
Engineering Professor Tony Overfelt. ACER is
funded by the Federal Aviation Administration
Cooperative Agreement and several universities
are member partners including Auburn
University, Kansas State University, and
Harvard University, among others. The group
also collaborates with numerous private sector
and national laboratories including The Boeing
Company and Delta Airlines.
“The airline industry supports the research
because they want to know if they really are
responsible for people getting diseases when they
travel,” Barbaree said.
For more information on Barbaree and his
research, go to his website at www.auburn.edu/
academic/cosam/faculty/biology/barbaree/.
About Barbaree
Professor Barbaree played football
for the University of Southern
Mississippi, where he was a three-year
letterman and a starter on the 1962
small college national championship
team. He received a bachelor of
science in zoology and a master’s in
microbiology, both from the University
of Southern Mississippi. He went on
to receive his doctorate in bacteriology
from the University of Georgia.
In 1991, Barbaree transferred as a
captain in the U.S. Army to the U.S.
Public Health Service Commissioned
Corps and joined the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention, or
CDC. Twenty years later, he retired
from the military and the CDC
before beginning a second career at
Auburn. At the CDC, he was chief
of the Respiratory Bacterial Diseases
Epidemic Investigations Laboratory.
A native of Union Springs, Ala.,
when Barbaree came to Auburn
University in 1991, it was not his first
time to set foot on the Plains. His
father, James Baker Barbaree, played
one year of football for Auburn under
the leadership of then-freshmanfootball-coach Ralph “Shug” Jordan
and was an Auburn fan.
Barbaree served as chair of the
Department of Biological Sciences
from 2002 to 2008. He serves on
two university committees: the
Intercollegiate Athletics Committee
and the University Budget A