Skip to main content
ARS Home » Midwest Area » Ames, Iowa » National Animal Disease Center » Ruminant Diseases and Immunology Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #95570
Title: THE USE OF VITAMIN D3 TO IMPROVE BEEF TENDERNESS

Author
item MONTGOMERY, J - IOWA STATE UNIV., AMES
item PARRISH, F - IOWA STATE UNIV., AMES
item BEITZ, D - IOWA STATE UNIV., AMES
item HORST, RONALD
item HUFF LONERGAN, E - AUBURN UNIV., AL
item TRENKLE, A - IOWA STATE UNIV., AMES

Submitted to: Journal of Animal Science
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 8/1/1999
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary: Vitamin D is required for the body to build strong healthy bones and teeth. If mammals do not receive enough vitamin D they are unable to get the proper amount of calcium into their body to allow normal bone and tooth formation. However, if they receive too much vitamin D, more calcium than is needed can enter the body and blood calcium concentrations can rise to 40-50% above normal. If blood calcium remains at these concentrations for several days, animals can become sick and eventually die. However, most mammals can tolerate an increase in blood calcium by 20-30% for 3-5 days without any detrimental effects on performance. In this report we summarize results from experiments with beef cattle, suggesting that creating a 20-30% elevation in blood calcium by feeding excess vitamin D 2-3 days before slaughter results in a tenderizing effect on meat. This result occurred in the absence of detrimental effects on feed intake or other performance parameters. Therefore, feeding excess vitamin D for short periods of time represents a very practical "on the farm" method of enhancing meat tenderness which would, hopefully, result in augmenting the acceptance of beef by the American and foreign consumers.

Technical Abstract: An experiment was designed to test the hypothesis that short-term oral administration of dietary vitamin D3 to beef cattle before slaughter would increase beef tenderness through greater calcium-activated calpain activity in postmortem aged skeletal muscle. Thirty continental crossbred steers were allotted randomly to 3 treatment groups housed in one pen. One group served as control; 2 other groups were administered by bolusing with either 5 or 7.5 million IU of vitamin D3 daily for 9 d. Cattle were slaughtered 1 d later. Blood samples were collected at the same time daily and at the time of slaughter for the quantification of plasma calcium. The longissimus lumborum was excised from each carcass 72 h postmortem and aged for 7, 14 and 21 d, and semi-membranous muscle (top round) was excised from each carcass 72 h postmortem and aged for 7, 14, and 21 d for subsequent Warner-Bratzler shear force determination, sensory evaluation, and Western blotting. Concentrations of calcium in plasma and muscles from cattle treated with 5 or 7.5 million IU of vitamin D3 were higher (P less than .05) than those from controls. Strip loin and top round steaks from cattle fed supplemental doses of vitamin D3 had lower (P less than .05) Warner-Bratzler shear values at 14 d postmortem than did those from controls. Sensory results support the finding that vitamin D3 improves tenderness. Western blotting analysis of samples from strip loin and top round steaks of the vitamin D3-fed cattle showed more proteolysis (P less than .05) than did steaks from control cattle. Therefore, the use of supplemental dietary vitamin D3 when given daily for 8 d before slaughter will improve tenderness of beef from grain-fed cattle, and the mechanism of tenderization seems to be due to increased proteolysis.