Öz
Food safety is a major concern for human health. Foodborne pathogens are responsible for several millions of cases annually worldwide. In order to inactivate these foodborne pathogens, numerous methods are available. However, these conventional methods have several drawbacks, such as heat treatment significantly affects nutritional properties of foods, chemical sanitizers leave residue on foods and food contact surfaces, high-pressure applications require special and relatively expensive equipment, and antibiotic use leads microorganisms to develop antibiotic resistance. One method that could overcome these drawbacks is bacteriophage application. Bacteriophages, or shortly phages, are viruses that infect bacteria, and they are found everywhere where bacteria are found. During the infection progeny phages are produced and phages inactivate bacteria by bursting the cell wall. Phage isolation can easily be done from natural sources like animal feces, wastewater, and sewage. In recent years, there have been many studies about phage application. When phages are applied on foods, they do not affect sensory or nutritional values of foods, humans, and environment. Also, since they are host specific, they only inactivate pathogenic bacteria. In addition, they have a different inactivation mechanism than antibiotics so phages can inactive antibiotic resistant bacteria as well. There are phage-based commercial products that are approved to be used on foods. On the other hand, there are technical and regulatory challenges. To overcome technical challenges, academic studies are being conducted. This study aims to generalize the use of bacteriophages in food industry by reviewing research articles in this area.