Effect of muscle type and CO-pretreatment combinations on the colour stability, protein oxidation and shelf-life of vacuum packaged beef steaks

This study investigated the effects of CO-pretreatments on three bovine muscles: Psoas major (PM), Gluteus medius (GM) and Semitendinosus (ST) on colour stability and quality attributes under anaerobic conditions. Steaks were exposed to one of four pretreatments: 1% CO for 5 h, 5% CO for 5 h, 1% CO for 24 h, with 60% CO2, (balance N2) or untreated (control) and then vacuum packaged and displayed (28 days at 2 °C). CO pretreatments improved redness for colour labile muscles (PM and GM). The optimum CO pretreatment was 1% for 5 h as this induced surface redness while discolouring (a* = 12, C* = 16) by the use-by-date (28 days). CO pretreatments decreased protein oxidation (P \u3c 0.01), and had no negative effect on pH and spoilage bacteria (P \u3e 0.05). Applying a 1% CO pretreatment for 5 h effectively enhanced the colour of various muscles while not masking spoilage thus addressing consumer concerns

The application of carbon monoxide in meat packaging needs to be re-evaluated within the EU: An overview

Carbon monoxide (CO) has many value-added benefits in meat packaging due to its colour stabilising effects and enhancement of meat quality attributes. The regulation of CO within meat packaging varies worldwide and remains a topical and controversial issue. CO is prohibited in the EU for use in meat packaging mainly due to fears it may mask spoilage therefore misleading consumers. The issue of consumer acceptance of CO was not considered. This article reviews the most pertinent literature to assess if the problems associated with the prohibition have been addressed. Applying CO pretreatments prior to vacuum packaging enhances colour while allowing discolouration to occur by the use-by-date, thereby addressing concerns about safety. Recent work showing European consumer acceptance of CO in meat packaging demonstrates its future potential within the EU. The information provided may support framing future policies intended to assure consumer protection, safety, choice and interest. Re-evaluation of permitting CO as a packaging gas within the EU may be warranted

The effect of carbon monoxide pretreatment exposure time on the colour stability and quality attributes of vacuum packaged beef steaks

The effect of 5% CO pretreatments prior to vacuum packaging of beef striploin steaks (Longissimus thoracis et lumborum, LTL) on quality attributes, primarily colour stability was investigated. The aim was to determine the optimum pretreatment that would induce the desirable red colour, while allowing discoloration to occur by the end of a 28-day display period (2°C), so as to not mask spoilage. A range of pretreatment exposure times (1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 15 and 24h) were applied to steaks using a gas mixture of 5% CO, 60% CO2 and 35% N2. The 5h CO pretreatment exposure time achieved the desirable colour and discoloration reached unacceptable levels (a*=12, C*=16) by the use-by date (28days), thus ensuring consumers\u27 of a reliable visual indication of freshness and addressing concerns about safety. The 5% CO pretreatment had no negative effect on microbiological safety, lipid oxidation, cooking loss and WBSF measurements at the end of storage (P\u3e0.05)

The Effects of Varying Gas Concentrations and Exposure Times on Colour Stability and Shelf-Life of Vacuum Packaged Beef Steaks Subjected to Carbon Monoxide Pretreatment

There is an emerging demand for more value-added meat packaging technologies which enhance meat quality. Overall, colour is the most important quality trait judged at point of purchase as sensory traits cannot be physically assessed prior to consumption (Carpenter, Cornforth, & Whittier, 2001; Van Rooyen, Allen, Crawley, & O’Connor, 2017). Consumers use colour as an indicator of freshness and wholesomeness and this influences perceived meat quality (Carpenter et al., 2001; Issanchou, 1996), while discoloration is associated with unwholesomeness (Faustman & Cassens, 1990) and leads to economic losses (Kropf, Hunt, & Piske, 1986) and food waste. Packaging directly affects the colour and quality of meat (Bernués, Olaizola, & Corcoran, 2003) but high oxygen MAP which is widely used to enhance meat colour negatively affects tenderness (Clausen, 2004; Tørngren, 2003). Innovations in meat packaging which enhance colour coupled with increased tenderness would greatly assist the meat industry. Vacuum packaging permits prolonged storage in an anoxic environment favouring tenderness but has a negative effect on meat colour. Carbon monoxide (CO) applied as a pretreatment prior to vacuum packaging would enhance the colour and tenderness (Van Rooyen, Allen, Gallagher, & O’Connor, 2018). CO binds to myoglobin to form carboxymyoglobin and produces a much more stable cherry red colour compared to oxygen (oxymyoglobin) (El-Badawi, Cain, Samuels, & Anglemeier, 1964). Legislation on the use of CO in meat packaging varies globally. The EU prohibited the use of CO in meat packaging systems due to concerns it might be used to mislead consumers by presenting microbiologically spoiled meat with an attractive colour so that consumers may falsely perceive the meat as “fresh” since the colour is retained (European Commission, 2001). This would be a major consumer safety concern as safety is considered a prerequisite by consumers (Van Wezemael, Verbeke, Kügler, de Barcellos, & Grunert, 2010)

The functional role of producer diversity in ecosystems

Over the past several decades, a rapidly expanding field of research known as biodiversity and ecosystem functioning has begun to quantify how the world\u27s biological diversity can, as an independent variable, control ecological processes that are both essential for, and fundamental to, the functioning of ecosystems. Research in this area has often been justified on grounds that (1) loss of biological diversity ranks among the most pronounced changes to the global environment and that (2) reductions in diversity, and corresponding changes in species composition, could alter important services that ecosystems provide to humanity (e.g., food production, pest/disease control, water purification). Here we review over two decades of experiments that have examined how species richness of primary producers influences the suite of ecological processes that are controlled by plants and algae in terrestrial, marine, and freshwater ecosystems. Using formal meta-analyses, we assess the balance of evidence for eight fundamental questions and corresponding hypotheses about the functional role of producer diversity in ecosystems. These include questions about how primary producer diversity influences the efficiency of resource use and biomass production in ecosystems, how primary producer diversity influences the transfer and recycling of biomass to other trophic groups in a food web, and the number of species and spatial /temporal scales at which diversity effects are most apparent. After summarizing the balance of evidence and stating our own confidence in the conclusions, we outline several new questions that must now be addressed if this field is going to evolve into a predictive science that can help conserve and manage ecological processes in ecosystems

Opportunities for behavioral rescue under rapid environmental change

Laboratory measurements of physiological and demographic tolerances are important in understanding the impact of climate change on species diversity; however, it has been recognized that forecasts based solely on these laboratory estimates overestimate risk by omitting the capacity for species to utilize microclimatic variation via behavioral adjustments in activity patterns or habitat choice. The complex, and often context‐dependent nature, of microclimate utilization has been an impediment to the advancement of general predictive models. Here, we overcome this impediment and estimate the potential impact of warming on the fitness of ectotherms using a benefit/cost trade‐off derived from the simple and broadly documented thermal performance curve and a generalized cost function. Our framework reveals that, for certain environments, the cost of behavioral thermoregulation can be reduced as warming occurs, enabling behavioral buffering (e.g., the capacity for behavior to ameliorate detrimental impacts) and “behavioral rescue” from extinction in extreme cases. By applying our framework to operative temperature and physiological data collected at an extremely fine spatial scale in an African lizard, we show that new behavioral opportunities may emerge. Finally, we explore large‐scale geographic differences in the impact of behavior on climate‐impact projections using a global dataset of 38 insect species. These multiple lines of inference indicate that understanding the existing relationship between thermal characteristics (e.g., spatial configuration, spatial heterogeneity, and modal temperature) is essential for improving estimates of extinction risk

Multiethnic Meta-Analysis Identifies Ancestry-Specific and Cross-Ancestry Loci for Pulmonary Function

Nearly 100 loci have been identified for pulmonary function, almost exclusively in studies of European ancestry populations. We extend previous research by meta-analyzing genome-wide association studies of 1000 Genomes imputed variants in relation to pulmonary function in a multiethnic population of 90,715 individuals of European (N = 60,552), African (N = 8429), Asian (N = 9959), and Hispanic/Latino (N = 11,775) ethnicities. We identify over 50 additional loci at genome-wide significance in ancestry-specific or multiethnic meta-analyses. Using recent fine-mapping methods incorporating functional annotation, gene expression, and differences in linkage disequilibrium between ethnicities, we further shed light on potential causal variants and genes at known and newly identified loci. Several of the novel genes encode proteins with predicted or established drug targets, including KCNK2 and CDK12. Our study highlights the utility of multiethnic and integrative genomics approaches to extend existing knowledge of the genetics of lung function and clinical relevance of implicated loci

Clinical Characteristics, Racial Inequities, and Outcomes in Patients with Breast Cancer and COVID-19: A COVID-19 and Cancer Consortium (CCC19) Cohort Study

BACKGROUND: Limited information is available for patients with breast cancer (BC) and coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), especially among underrepresented racial/ethnic populations. METHODS: This is a COVID-19 and Cancer Consortium (CCC19) registry-based retrospective cohort study of females with active or history of BC and laboratory-confirmed severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection diagnosed between March 2020 and June 2021 in the US. Primary outcome was COVID-19 severity measured on a five-level ordinal scale, including none of the following complications, hospitalization, intensive care unit admission, mechanical ventilation, and all-cause mortality. Multivariable ordinal logistic regression model identified characteristics associated with COVID-19 severity. RESULTS: 1383 female patient records with BC and COVID-19 were included in the analysis, the median age was 61 years, and median follow-up was 90 days. Multivariable analysis revealed higher odds of COVID-19 severity for older age (aOR per decade, 1.48 [95% CI, 1.32-1.67]); Black patients (aOR 1.74; 95 CI 1.24-2.45), Asian Americans and Pacific Islander patients (aOR 3.40; 95 CI 1.70-6.79) and Other (aOR 2.97; 95 CI 1.71-5.17) racial/ethnic groups; worse ECOG performance status (ECOG PS ≥2: aOR, 7.78 [95% CI, 4.83-12.5]); pre-existing cardiovascular (aOR, 2.26 [95% CI, 1.63-3.15])/pulmonary comorbidities (aOR, 1.65 [95% CI, 1.20-2.29]); diabetes mellitus (aOR, 2.25 [95% CI, 1.66-3.04]); and active and progressing cancer (aOR, 12.5 [95% CI, 6.89-22.6]). Hispanic ethnicity, timing, and type of anti-cancer therapy modalities were not significantly associated with worse COVID-19 outcomes. The total all-cause mortality and hospitalization rate for the entire cohort was 9% and 37%, respectively however, it varied according to the BC disease status. CONCLUSIONS: Using one of the largest registries on cancer and COVID-19, we identified patient and BC-related factors associated with worse COVID-19 outcomes. After adjusting for baseline characteristics, underrepresented racial/ethnic patients experienced worse outcomes compared to non-Hispanic White patients. FUNDING: This study was partly supported by National Cancer Institute grant number P30 CA068485 to Tianyi Sun, Sanjay Mishra, Benjamin French, Jeremy L Warner; P30-CA046592 to Christopher R Friese; P30 CA023100 for Rana R McKay; P30-CA054174 for Pankil K Shah and Dimpy P Shah; KL2 TR002646 for Pankil Shah and the American Cancer Society and Hope Foundation for Cancer Research (MRSG-16-152-01-CCE) and P30-CA054174 for Dimpy P Shah. REDCap is developed and supported by Vanderbilt Institute for Clinical and Translational Research grant support (UL1 TR000445 from NCATS/NIH). The funding sources had no role in the writing of the manuscript or the decision to submit it for publication. CLINICAL TRIAL NUMBER: CCC19 registry is registered on ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT04354701

The Effect of Carbon Monoxide pre-Treatments on the Colour Stability of Vacuum Packaged Beef Steaks

Carbon monoxide (CO) as a component of wood smoke has a long history of applications in meat, fish, vegetable and fruit processing. More recently it has been used in meat packaging to enhance colour stability. Concerns have been raised by regulatory authorities that CO may mask meat spoilage and meat might be sold beyond its sell-by-date due to the bright red colour being retained. This study investigated the use of 5% CO as a pre-treatment prior to vacuum packaging beef striploin steaks (Longissimus thoracis et lumborum, LTL) to induce the desirable cherry red colour, while determining the optimum pre-treatment time to allow discoloration by 28 days of storage (2°C). A range of pre-treatment exposure times (1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 15 and 24 h) were applied to steaks using a gas mixture of 5% CO, 60% CO2 and 35% N2. Colour analysis was measured over 28 days of storage and microbiological analysis was analysed at the end of storage. The CO5 treatment appears to be the most appropriate as the bright cherry red colour desirable to consumers was achieved, and discolouration reached unacceptable levels (a* = 12, C* = 16)by the use-date of 28 days, thus ensuring the consumer of a reliable visual indication of freshness and addressing concerns about consumer safety. The 5% CO pre-treatment had no negative effect on the microbiological safety of steaks (P\u3e0.05)

The effect of temperature during retail display on the colour stability of CO pretreated vacuum packaged beef steaks

The effect of CO pretreatments applied to beef striploin steaks (Longissimus thoracis et lumborum, LTL) prior to vacuum packaging and display temperature on colour stability, shelf life and tenderness was determined. Steaks were exposed to 5% CO, 60% CO2 and 35% N2 for 3 (CO3), 5 (CO5) or 7 (CO7) h, followed by 28 days display at 2 °C (good industry practice) or 6 °C (mild abuse). CO5 was the optimum exposure time as it induced the desirable colour while not retaining the bright colour, irrespective of display temperature. K/S ratios confirmed that CO pretreatment did not mask spoilage and could be more sensitive than colour parameters at monitoring discoloration as colour was not retained. Exposure to CO did not have any negative effect on meat quality attributes, while mild temperature abuse (6 °C) increased purge loss and decreased pH