Effects of Pulsed Electric Fields on Selected Quality Attributes of Beef Outside Flat (Biceps femoris)

Abstract

Abstract-Pulsed electric field (PEF) processing is a nonthermal food processing technology that applies brief (µs) electrical pulses of high voltage to food products placed between two electrodes. Depending on the process intensity, the process affects cell membrane permeability due to localised structural changes. There are few reports on the use of PEF for the processing of solid foods like meat. Therefore, the current project was designed to assess the impact of PEF processing on beef muscles and its potential use to reduce meat ageing time and cost. Post rigor Biceps femoris (a low value beef muscle) cuts were exposed to PEF (electric field strength of 1.7 -2.0 kV/cm and pulsed electrical energy of 185 kJ/kg) processing and sampled after aging at 4 o C for 3, 7, 14 or 21 days. Samples were assessed for temperature increases, electrical conductivity, pH, purge loss, cooking loss, tenderness and colour stability. The microstructure of PEF treated and untreated meat samples were also investigated. Our results showed that temperature, electrical conductivity, and pH were significantly (P<0.05) affected by PEF treatment conditions. Tenderness, as indicated by a reduced shear force value, significantly (P<0.05) increased following PEF treatment compared to the untreated samples. Cooking loss was not affected by PEF treatment, whilst purge loss significantly (P<0.05) increased after PEF treatment and during ageing. The PEF treated meat samples showed a dramatic increase in the number of myofibrils ruptured along the z-lines compared to the untreated samples during ageing. This resulted in beef muscle with a more porous structure compared to the untreated samples and accounts for the observed increase in electrical conductivity and purge loss. These results suggest that PEF induces changes in the microstructure and texture of meat and could potentially be used to improve tenderness, decrease ageing time or to alter functional properties.

Exploring the Effect of Pulsed Electric Fields on the Technological Properties of Chicken Meat

“…Similar results were also observed on beef [ 22 , 29 ]. However, the application of PEF with high total specific energy input (>150 kJ/kg) was found to be associated with a significant decrease in muscular pH values, due to a modification in meat conductivity caused by the leakage of intracellular liquids following cellular electroporation [ 30 ]. Considering that the highest total energy input achieved within this study was 2.42 kJ/kg ( Table 1 and Table 2 ), it is reasonable to assume that the treatments performed in the experiments were not strong enough to induce cell breakdown and thus the leakage of cellular fluids.…”

Evaluation of ultrasound and pulsed electric field combinations on the cooking Losses, texture Profile, and Taste-Related amino acids of chicken breast meat

“…High-intensity PEF can disrupt cell membranes, which can lead to leakage of intracellular contents, including acidic metabolites such as lactic acid, into the extracellular space [37] , consequently lowering the overall tissue pH in US + PEF-5 samples. Additionally, PEF can induce unfolding of proteins within muscle cells, which may expose acidic groups typically buried within the protein structure, further contributing to the observed decrease in pH [17] . The PEF treatment time (30 s) was deliberately chosen following preliminary tests to achieve optimal cell membrane permeabilization while simultaneously preventing any potential adverse effects on other quality characteristics of the meat.…”

“…Moreover, both high-frequency focused ultrasound at 30 min and high-intensity ultrasound at 40 min have been found to improve beef tenderness (decrease in shear force) without negatively affecting the color, pH, drip loss, and water-holding capacity of meat [13] , [16] . PEF, on the other hand, disrupts cell membranes, potentially improving moisture retention and overall texture through enhanced permeability [17] . PEF has been studied for its potential in meat tenderization [18] , reduction of sous vide processing time [19] , and impact on meat protein digestion [20] .…”

Techniques for postmortem tenderisation in meat processing: effectiveness, application and possible mechanisms

“…PEF treatment has a remarkable impact on tenderising process, and the inconsistent results on whether PEF can improve the tenderness of post-rigor muscles also deserve mention. The main contradictions are listed as: (1) whether the muscles treated with high-intensity PEF will obtain appropriate ageing time as ageing tenderisation is a biochemical process (Arroyo, Eslami, et al 2015;Faridnia et al 2016;O'Dowd et al 2013); (2) whether low-intensity PEF is insufficient to induce physical destruction of myofibres since lowintensity PEF probably cannot result in sufficient release of Ca 2+ and enzymes from organelles to induce irreversible membrane permeability (Arroyo, Lascorz, et al 2015;Faridnia et al 2014); and (3) whether the anatomical and physiological differences in muscles can cause different muscles to display frequency-dependent or repeat-dependent characteristics because these differences can affect heat generation, conductivity, myofibre composition and cell membrane characteristics Suwandy et al 2015a;Suwandy et al 2015c).…”