Recipient Organization
OKLAHOMA STATE UNIVERSITY
(N/A)
STILLWATER,OK 74078
Performing Department
(N/A)
Non Technical Summary
This seed grant project is significant to the meat industry and the public, as it focuses on establishing traceable molecular indicators in meat that can be used to assess meat discoloration attributes and, in turn, its quality. To identify and understand the molecular indicators, we will have to conduct a range of well-defined experiments using various meat extracts and probe the redox properties of various molecules. We will assess the sensor's ability to account for variations in meat color due to age and processing, as well as the starting meat color variable. Additional factors influencing color and their relationship with redox potential, as well as economic assessment, will be investigated when compared to traditional assays (oxygen consumption or spectrophotometric assays) in helping to determine meat quality and lipid oxidation-induced destabilization.
Animal Health Component
30%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
50%
Applied
30%
Developmental
20%
Goals / Objectives
Objective 1. We hypothesize that mitochondrial changes and degradation are associated with changes in meat color. We anticipate pinpointing the complexes within mitochondria to understand the relationship with meat color. The current research aims to enhance our understanding of meat discoloration. Once the relationship has been clearly defined, we plan to analyze the economic benefits of meat color prediction compared to the benefits of reducing meat waste.Mapping of oxidation and reduction potentials of isolated mitochondria and understanding their relation to meat discoloration monitored in parallel for the same extract and under identical conditions: Within this initial phase, our primary effort will be to profile the oxidation and reduction peaks electrochemically (current vs. applied voltage scan versus Ag/AgCl reference electrode on a micrometer-scale screen-printed strip), focusing on their subtle intensity changes that result from changes in mitochondria redox strengths (peak potentials and their current values). Limited or no knowledge is currently available on how meat mitochondrial reduction activity can be probed and established as a tool through an electrochemical method that offers advantages including target molecule selectivity, simplicity (like a personalized, portable, miniature point-of-need glucometer), speed, inherent high sensitivity of the electrochemistry, 96-sample throughput array, scalable, and cost-effective carbon electrode arrays over all other known methods.Objective 1A added from the panel comment. We will conduct experiments to assess the sensor's ability to account for variations in meat color due to age and processing. The panel suggested starting meat color variable will also be addressed under this objective.Objective 1B. Additional factors influencing color and their relationship with redox potential (2) validation and economic assessment, when compared to the traditional assays (oxygen consumption or spectrophotometric assays), in helping determine meat quality.Objective 1C. Lipid oxidation-induced destabilization of myoglobin.Objective 2. Enabling application (translational goal) to a large pool and variety of mitochondria samples (with aging time and meat of different pHs) and biochemical validation with meat oxygenation and discoloration. The knowledge gained from mechanistic mitochondrial redox insights will enable the translation of a new methodology that holds the potential to establish an innovative meat mitochondrial quality sensor tool with promising implications.Objective 3. Currently, there are no tools available to predict meat color. One of the primary challenges is gaining a precise understanding of the factors that influence meat color. In this research, an electrochemistry approach will help to understand the role of the mitochondrial electron transport chain in meat color. The advantage of directly probing mitochondrial enzymes, proteins, and cofactors is that it is superior to highly fluctuating oxygen measurement and indirect colorimetric methods, which do not directly probe the biomolecules of interest in the meat. Nevertheless, we will conduct a comparative assessment of the proposed method's performance metrics against those of oxygen and color sensors currently on the market.
Project Methods
Electrochemical technique andSpectrophotometry.