Abstract
Simple SummaryThe current work evaluated the breast muscle performance, meat quality traits, and myofiber characteristics of Da-Heng meat type birds with 60, 90, 120, 150, 180 days of age. Older chickens often presented a higher pH, lower drip loss, higher shear force, darker, and redder breast meat. The correlation coefficients showed that myofiber characteristics played an important role in breast pH values, drip loss, and meat color.Due to the increasing demand for producing chickens with high meat quality, there is a need to determine its mode of action on chicken meat quality traits across a wider age spectrum. In this study, five groups of 200 male Da-Heng meat type birds were reared until slaughter age of 60, 90, 120, 150, 180 days old and breast muscle performance, meat quality traits, and myofiber characteristics were evaluated. The larger body weight and breast weight of chicken are based on larger myofiber diameter and area, less myofiber density for the older birds than younger birds. There was an age effect on all meat quality traits of chicken breast muscle (p < 0.05). Older chickens often presented a higher pH, lower drip loss, higher shear force, darker, and redder breast meat. The correlation coefficients showed that myofiber characteristics played an important role in breast pH values, drip loss, and meat color (p < 0.05). Besides, significant correlations were also found between meat quality traits (p < 0.05). Further studies are needed to explore the biochemical character and potential molecular mechanism of chicken breast muscle to determine the factors that causes these age-related differences in meat quality in the current study.
Highlights
China is the world’s largest meat market, consuming 18% of the chicken produced worldwide.current forecasts and projection studies have predicted that the expansion of the poultry market will continue in the future [1]
The breast weight was extremely higher in birds at 180 days of age than that at 150 days of age (p < 0.01)
The significant positive correlations between myofiber properties and growth performance suggested that the larger body weight and breast weight of chicken were based on larger myofiber diameter and area, less myofiber density for the older birds than the younger birds, which is consistent with the earlier findings of Chen and Iwamoto et al [18,27]
Summary
China is the world’s largest meat market, consuming 18% of the chicken produced worldwide.current forecasts and projection studies have predicted that the expansion of the poultry market will continue in the future [1]. China is the world’s largest meat market, consuming 18% of the chicken produced worldwide. Poultry meat, breast meat, is popular due to its healthy nutritional profile, fitting the modern consumer demand for low fat, sodium, and cholesterol [2]. An intense genetic selection for fast growth rate and high breast yield has led to progressive improvements in meat production [3]. These advances have been often accompanied by deterioration of the meat type birds meat quality, including high incidence of muscle. Chicken meat is widely sold as parts or further-processed products, indicating the importance of meat quality in the poultry industry [6]. As living standards have improved, the qualitative properties of the meat need to be guaranteed to meet the demand under quality and health conditions [7]
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