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ARS Home » Plains Area » Clay Center, Nebraska » U.S. Meat Animal Research Center » Meat Safety and Quality » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #159119
Title: DEVELOPMENT OF OPTIMAL PROTOCOL FOR VISIBLE AND NEAR-INFRARED REFLECTANCE SPECTROSCOPIC EVALUATION OF MEAT QUALITY

Author
item Shackelford, Steven
item Wheeler, Tommy
item Koohmaraie, Mohammad

Submitted to: Meat Science
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 4/6/2004
Publication Date: 6/20/2004
Citation: Shackelford, S.D., Wheeler, T.L., Koohmaraie, M. 2004. Development of optimal protocol for visible and near-infrared reflectance spectroscopic evaluation of meat quality. Meat Science. 68:371-381.

Interpretive Summary: The meat industry has long sought non-destructive, objective techniques to predict meat quality. Several studies have shown that near-infrared reflectance spectroscopy can be used to predict beef tenderness. However, the procedures used in those studies were either destructive in that they required excision of a muscle sample for spectroscopy or they were limited to sampling a very small area and, thus, would be highly-subject to error induced by non-representative sampling of the target muscle or interference from intramuscular fat. Therefore, the present experiments were conducted to develop a repeatable, non-destructive technique for visible and near-infrared reflectance spectroscopic evaluation of meat quality. The protocol developed in this experiment should facilitate future experiments to determine if visible and near-infrared spectroscopy can be used to accurately predict meat quality.

Technical Abstract: The present experiments were conducted to develop an optimal protocol for visible and near-infrared reflectance spectroscopic evaluation of meat quality. It was determined that spectra were more repeatable using a 35-mm-diameter high-intensity reflectance probe rather than a 3-mm-diameter reflectance probe. Using the high-intensity reflectance probe, spectra were generally very repeatable (e.g., repeatability at 1080 nm ranged from 0.94 to 0.99) regardless of the number (50, 40, 30, 20, or 10) of spectra averaged per observation. At each wavelength (350 to 2500 nm), the highest repeatability was obtained when 20 spectra were averaged. It was determined that spectra were greatly different when the length of time that the muscle was exposed to air (bloomed) before spectroscopy was increased from 2 min to 60 min. However, regardless of bloom time, the repeatability of reflectance values was > 0.90 at each wavelength between 462 and 1371 nm. The protocol developed in this experiment should facilitate future experiments to determine if visible and near-infrared spectroscopy can be used to accurately predict meat quality.