From Fish Eggs to Fish Name: Caviar Species Discrimination by COIBar-RFLP, an Efficient Molecular Approach to Detect Fraud in the Caviar Trade.

Anna Maria Pappalardo,Teresa Capriglione,Agnese Petraccioli,Venera Ferrito

doi:10.3390/molecules24132468

Anna Maria Pappalardo, Teresa Capriglione + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules24132468

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Abstract

The demand for caviar is growing as is its price on the market. Due to the decline of true caviar production from sturgeons, eggs from other fish species and other animals have been used as substitutes for caviar. The labels on these products should indicate the species from which the eggs were derived, but the label can be misleading in some cases. In this context, species identification using DNA analysis is crucial for traceability and authentication of caviar products. In this work, we applied the COIBar-RFLP procedure to obtain species-specific endonuclease restriction patterns useful to discriminate “caviar” species. The tested caviar products were identified as originating from eight species: Acipenser transmontanus, A. gueldenstaedtii, A. stellatus, A. baerii, Mallotus villosus, Huso huso, Cyclopterus lumpus and Eumicrotremus orbis. The results demonstrated that 14% of the caviar products examined have a label that does not indicate the species from which the eggs were originated. The MboI restriction enzyme produced specific profiles discriminating the eight species, confirming that the COIBar-RFLP is a useful approach for routine screening of seafood products due to its ease and rapid execution, as the results of screening can be obtained within 7 h, by-passing the need for sequencing.

Highlights

Sturgeon eggs, known as “caviar”, represent one of the most valuable delicacies on the world’s food market
Caviar products include the aforementioned true caviar, and caviar substitutes obtained from eggs of other fish species or other animal organisms, and a variety of other products called “caviar” that have no trace of fish eggs but simulate the taste of caviar [3]
The NJ tree (Figure 1) built using the sequences of the twenty species downloaded from GenBank (Table 1) and the sequences obtained from the commercial samples, identified by the BLAST search (Table 2), confirmed that the eight caviar species belong to three families: Acipenseridae

Summary

Introduction

Known as “caviar”, represent one of the most valuable delicacies on the world’s food market. The standard for sturgeon caviar [2], adopted in 2010, indicates that caviar is the product made from fish eggs, treated with grade salt, of the Acipenseridae family (including the genera Acipenser, Huso, Pseudoscaphirhynchus and Scaphirhynchus). In regards to the labeling of commercial products, the term “caviar” must be used only for sturgeon eggs and labels should include the common name of the species, such as Beluga for Huso huso, Osetra for Acipenser gueldenstaedtii/A. persicus and Sevruga for Acipenser transmontanus. Caviar products include the aforementioned true caviar, and caviar substitutes obtained from eggs of other fish species or other animal organisms, and a variety of other products called “caviar” that have no trace of fish eggs but simulate the taste of caviar [3]. The prices of the various types of caviar vary considerably, with only true caviar considered a luxury high-priced product

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