Characteristics and Application in Food Preservatives of Lactobacillus plantarum TK9 Isolated from Naturally Fermented Congee

In the present research, a strain of TK9 was isolated from the Chinese naturally fermented congee and its characteristics for probiotic and food preservation were investigated. In terms of probiotic, the strain not only survives bile salts and simulated gastric juice but grows well under hypertonic conditions. Besides, the TK9 exhibited a broad antifungal spectrum, including most of the species closely related to food spoilage, like , , , , and . But no evident inhibition effect was found on . To further evaluate its potential as bio-preservative, TK9 was inoculated into citrus, apples and yogurt prior to the addition of moulds. The results indicated that TK9 could obviously prolong shelf life of the test food for 72–96 h and represent an excellent candidate for food-related bio-preservative.