HOUSTON, Feb. 10 (Xinhua) -- Peanut Corporation of America (PCA)has closed its plant in Plainview, Texas, after laboratory tests of sample products from the plant indicated the possible presence of salmonella, authorities said on Tuesday.

    PCA suspended operations at its Plainview plant and notified the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) of possible salmonella presence in some of its products on Monday night, DSHS said in a news release.

    DSHS officials said none of the implicated products from the plant -- peanut meal, granulated peanuts and dry roasted peanuts --have reached consumers.

    The peanut meal and granulated peanuts had not been shipped out of the Plainview plant. Dry roasted peanuts that had been shipped to a distributor were also recalled before further distribution, according to DSHS officials.

    It is not yet known if the salmonella possibly found in the product testing is the same strain of the bacterium implicated in a 43-state outbreak of salmonellosis, officials said.

    The company must meet specific criteria set by DSHS before it can resume production, they said.

    The plant was closed following the suspension of PCA's Blakely, Georgia, plant last month, which is blamed for a nationwide salmonella outbreak that has sickened 600 people and may have caused at least eight deaths in 44 of the 50 U.S. states.