## 1 Introduction  
Pathogenic serotypes of _Salmonella_ are a major cause of foodborne diseases worldwide. The annual proportion of food origin salmonellosis in Australia is about 40,000 out of an estimated total of about 4.1 million foodborne gastroenteritis cases [1]. _Salmonella_- associated foodborne illnesses have risen during the past 20 years and the rate of salmonellosis in Australia is much higher compared to economically similar countries [2]. It has been estimated that foodborne illnesses due to _Salmonella_ spp. have caused up to 35% of hospitalisations and 28% of mortalities [1], and the hospitalisation and death cases were higher in comparison to other foodborne illnesses [1]. Among the salmonellosis cases of foodborne origin, raw eggs and egg-based products have the highest frequency [3, 4, 5]. For example, between 2001 and 2016, 50% of all foodborne _Salmonella_ illnesses in Australia were attributed to the consumption of contaminated eggs [6]; 84% of these cases were caused by _Salmonella enterica_ subspecies _enterica_ serotype Typhimurium (S. Typhimurium) and three cases were caused by _Salmonella enterica_ subspecies _enterica_ serotype Enteritidis (S. Enteritidis) [6]. In other countries, salmonellosis is caused predominantly by the serotype Enteritidis [7; 8; 9]. As egg consumption in Australia is approx. 245 eggs per capita and growing [10], the industry is continuously exploring alternative means to address _Salmonella_ contamination. Unlike the one-off input costs for the establishment of farm infrastructure and human resources, farms and industries incur ongoing costs for egg hygiene and egg safety management. Washing and disinfection of egg surface are the key steps involved in egg production to reduce the risk of egg-related foodborne illnesses and to maintain consumer confidence on the microbiological safety of eggs. Elimination of pathogenic bacteria from the egg surface is achieved using several techniques and many eggshell sanitisation methods are also employed to reduce the contamination of eggs by _Salmonella_ in commercial egg production premises. Protocols employed for the reduction of _Salmonella_ can be broadly classified into thermal and non-thermal disinfection procedures. Thermal disinfection, such as egg pasteurisation, is a highly effective method, but negatively affects egg proteins and rheological properties [11]. The most common non-thermal processes employ quaternary ammonium compounds (QAC) and chlorine-based chemicals [12] to sanitise eggs after washing with a high pH (11.0) detergent solution at a temperature above 40 \({}^{\circ}\)C. Unfortunately, bacteria may develop resistance to QAC [13], which in turn induces selection of genes for co-resistance to other antimicrobials [14], thus limiting its use. In the case of chlorine-based sanitiers, besides the development of bacterial resistance due to its persistent usage [15], the accumulation of organic load from dirt, manure and broken eggs reduces the chlorine concentration, affecting the efficacy of chlorine-based sanitisation. Moreover, due to the environmental impact caused by chlorine-based by-products and the problems with wastewater disposal, its usage in the food industry is limited. Other decontamination methods used are ultraviolet (UV) irradiation of eggs after washing and formaldehyde fumigation. However, the antibacterial activity of UV irradiation protocol is limited to the egg surface directly exposed to UV rays [16], while formaldehyde is a known occupational health hazard and a carcinogenic product [17]. Since occupational health safety and environmental regulations continually push towards safer eggshell sanitiers, electrochemically activated solutions (ECAS) (also called electrolysed oxidizing (EO) water) could be a potential alternative for eggshell cleaning and disinfection. The three forms of ECAS (acidic, slightly acidic and neutral) have been previously assessed for the sanitisation of table eggs in safe food production [18; 19; 20; 21] and fertile eggs for quality production of chicks [22].