Gund Affiliate, Assistant Professor, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences

Dr. Andrea Etter is an assistant professor in the department of Nutrition and Food Sciences where she works on understanding the factors that lead to foodborne outbreaks, both from the bacterial and human angles. Drawing on her experience of homesteading in rural WI as a child, Andrea is particularly interested in the biosecurity risks associated with homesteading and backyard farming, and in improving outreach and education to this under-reached group.

Current projects include:
• Understanding how common Salmonella is in backyard laying hens and hatchling chicks and what owners know about biosecurity and best practices to avoid catching Salmonella from their birds
• Determining the importance of sanitizer tolerance and biofilm formation capability to Listeria monocytogenes colonization of Vermont dairies and cheesemaking facilities
• Understanding whether bacterial stress tolerance is a key contributing factor to foodborne outbreaks of Salmonella enterica

Publications

  • Assisi C, Forauer E, Oliver HF, Etter AJ. 2020. Genomic and Transcriptomic Analysis of Biofilm Formation in Persistent and Transient Listeria monocytogenes Isolates from the Retail Deli Environment Does Not Yield Insight into Persistence Mechanisms. Foodborne Pathog. Dis. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33227214/
  • Forauer E, Wu ST, Etter AJ. 2020. Listeria monocytogenes in the Retail Deli Environment: a review. Food Control. 119.107443  https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0956713520303595
  • Etter, A.J., West, A.M., Burnett, J.L., Wu, S.T., Veenhuizen, D., Ogas, R.A., Oliver, H.F. 2019. Salmonella Heidelberg food isolates associated with a foodborne outbreak have enhanced stress tolerance capabilities. Appl. Environ. Microbiol. 85(16): https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31175193/
  • Etter, A.J.,* Hammons, S.R.,* Simmons, C., Roof, S, Wu, T., Cook, P.W., Katubig, A., Stasiewicz M.J., Wright, E., Worchocki, S., Thesmar, H.S., Hollingworth, J., Wiedmann, M., and Oliver, H.F. 2017. Enhanced sanitation standard operating procedures (SSOPs) have limited impact on Listeria monocytogenes prevalence in retail delis. J. Food Prot. 80(11): 1903-1912. *These authors contributed equally to this work. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29053419/
  • Wang, J.,* Ray, A.J.,* Hammons, S.R., and Oliver, H.F. Persistent and transient Listeria monocytogenes strains from retail deli environments vary in their ability to adhere and form biofilms and rarely have inlA premature stop codons. Foodborne Pathog. Dis. 2015; 12(2): 151-158. *These authors contributed equally to this work https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25569840/
Gund Affiliate Andrea Etter

Areas of Expertise and/or Research

Food safety, microbiology, homesteading biosecurity, foodborne outbreaks, risk communication 

Education

  • PhD, Interdisciplinary Life Sciences, Purdue University
  • BS, Biology, Maranatha Baptist University

CV

PDF icon Andrea Etter CV.pdf

Contact

Email:

Andrea.Etter@uvm.edu

Phone:
  • 802-656-0541
Website(s):
  1. UVM Profile
  2. ResearchGate