Evaluation of autolysis induced histologic alterations in skeletal muscle tissue of non-traditional meat animals

Abstract

Raw meat is characterized by various natural cellular processes that lead to its chemical content alteration. The purpose of the present study is to evaluate autolysis induced histologic alterations in skeletal muscle tissue of cow elk. In this study the authors used skeletal muscle tissue of 2-year-old cow elk. The tissue was sampled from m. quadriceps femoris. The study results showed that in 48 hours post mortem linear striation in muscle tissues was expressed. But 72 hours post mortem the integrity of muscle fibers degraded and they became inconsistently stained. The obtained data showed that post mortem alterations were characterized by significant degradation and separation of muscle fibers and nuclei and nuclear structures lysis.

Keywords:
elk meat; post mortem aging; muscle fibers; nuclei lysis; sarcolemma