Ultrasonographic determination of chemical composition and physical properties of meat in fattener pigs

Project 21-04 - Dr. Pawel Bartlewski

Dr. Pawel Bartlewski, University of Guelph
To provide high quality products to consumers, it is necessary for the food industry to obtain reliable information on factors influencing meat quality throughout the entire production cycle. At present, most meat quality traits are typically determined after slaughter, excluding potentially superior meat quality animals from reproduction. Several characteristics (e.g., color, pH and tenderness) are not monitored regularly or are not determined at all because their assessment is too cumbersome or costly. Therefore, it is important for the modern pork industry is to develop accurate, non-invasive, and inexpensive methods of predicting meat quality from observations and testing of live animals. It is feasible that all of the major physical and chemical properties of muscles could be determined using ultrasound technology. Computer-assisted analysis of ultrasonographic images can be used to assess chemical changes, muscle cell changes and physical properties in different tissues and internal organs. The major goal of the present project is to examine if there are relationships between the physical and chemical properties of the pigs' latissimus dorsi and semimembranosus muscles, and quantitative characteristics of their corresponding ultrasound images determined with the use of commercially available image analytical software packages.