This month's Short Talks from the Hill features Jennifer Acuff, assistant professor of food microbiology and safety in the Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences. Acuff is a researcher and scientist with the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station, the research arm of the U of A System Division of Agriculture.

Acuff's research focuses on food safety, specifically in areas related to beef, ready-to-eat foods and low-water-activity foods, such as dried fruits, nuts, spices and powders. In the podcast, she discusses how her research contributes to food safety and what everyone should know about this important topic.

"Food is never going to be sterile," Acuff says in the podcast. "It will never be risk-free. We wouldn't like sterile food — it wouldn't taste very good, to be honest. But if you can know what kind of risks might be associated with certain foods and decide if you're willing to take certain risks — because you really love raw cookie dough or maybe you really enjoy medium burgers. That might be a risk you're willing to take, but it's important to know what the risks are, so that you feel in control."

Acuff also discusses how people can get help about food safety.

"Part of my job actually is responding to people who send emails saying, 'I have a question about this,' 'I'm not sure if this is safe,' or 'I'm making this home canned good, is it okay if I do it in this manner?' I actually can do the research a little bit faster to send to the resource and save some people some time on that."

You can listen to the podcast with Acuff by clicking on the link above or by visiting arkansasresearch.uark.edu, the home of research and economic development news at the U of A.

Short Talks programming is available wherever you get your podcasts. Previous podcasts can be found at the link above.

Thank you for listening!