Molecular identification of adulteration in mutton based on mitochondrial16S rRNAgene

Heat-Treated Meat Origin Tracing and Authenticity through a Practical Multiplex Polymerase Chain Reaction Approach

Meat adulteration have become a global issue, which has increasingly raised concerns due to not only economic losses and religious issues, but also public safety and its negative effects on human health. Using optimal primers for seven target species, a multiplex PCR method was developed for the molecular authentication of camel, cattle, dog, pig, chicken, sheep and duck in one tube reaction. Species-specific amplification from the premixed total DNA of seven species was corroborated by DNA sequencing. The limit of detection (LOD) is as low as 0.025 ng DNA for the simultaneous identification of seven species in both raw and heat-processed meat or target meat: as little as 0.1% (w/w) of the total meat weight. This method is strongly reproducible even while exposed to intensively heat-processed meat and meat mixtures, which renders it able to trace meat origins in real-world foodstuffs based on the authenticity assessment of commercial meat samples. Therefore, this method is a powerful tool for the inspection of meat adulterants and has broad application prospects.

Molecular Authentication of Twelve Meat Species Through a Promising Two-Tube Hexaplex Polymerase Chain Reaction Technique

Frequent meat frauds have aroused significant social attention. The aim of this study is to construct a two-tube hexaplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method offering accurate molecular authentication of twelve meat species in actual adulteration event. Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) sequencing demonstrates that designed primers can specifically amplify target species from genomic DNA mixture of six species in each tube reaction, which showed 100% accuracy of horse (148 bp), pigeon (218 bp), camel (283 bp), rabbit (370 bp), ostrich (536 bp), and beef (610 bp) as well as turkey (124 bp), dog (149 bp), chicken (196 bp), duck (277 bp), cat (380 bp), and goose (468 bp). A species-specific primer pair produced the target band in the presence of target genomic DNA but not non-target species. Through multiplex PCR assays with serial concentration of the DNA mixture of six species in each PCR reaction, the detection limit (LOD) of the two-tube hexaplex PCR assay reached up to 0.05–0.1 ng. Using genomic DNA isolated from both boiled and microwave-cooked meat as templates, PCR amplification generated expected PCR products. These findings demonstrate that the proposed method is specific, sensitive and reproducible, and is adequate for food inspection. Most importantly, this method was successfully applied to detect meat frauds in commercial meat products. Therefore, this method is of great importance with a good application foreground.

Single tube multiplex PCR assay for the identification of banned meat species

Food adulteration has a direct impact on public health, religious faith, fair-trades, and wildlife. In the present study, a reliable and sensitive assay has been developed for verifying meat adulteration in food chain. The multiplex PCR system was optimised for identification of chicken, cow/buffalo, sheep/goat, horse/donkey, pork, and dog DNAs in a single reaction mixture simultaneously. The primers were designed using 12 S rRNA gene sequences with fragment size in the range of 113 bp to 800 bp, which can be easily visualised on agarose gel electrophoresis making the technique economical. After validation of accuracy, specificity, and sensitivity, commercially available meat products (n = 190) were screened, comprising both raw and cooked meat samples. The results demonstrated a high rate of adulteration (54.5%) in meat products. The technique developed here can be easily used for screening of different meat products for export and import purposes as well as for food inspection and livestock diagnostic laboratories.

Comparative review and the recent progress in detection technologies of meat product adulteration

Meat adulteration, mainly for the purpose of economic pursuit, is widespread and leads to serious public health risks, religious violations, and moral loss. Rapid, effective, accurate, and reliable detection technologies are keys to effectively supervising meat adulteration. Considering the importance and rapid advances in meat adulteration detection technologies, a comprehensive review to summarize the recent progress in this area and to suggest directions for future progress is beneficial. In this review, destructive meat adulteration technologies based on DNA, protein, and metabolite analyses and nondestructive technologies based on spectroscopy were comparatively analyzed. The advantages and disadvantages, application situations of these technologies were discussed. In the future, determining suitable indicators or markers is particularly important for destructive methods. To improve sensitivity and save time, new interdisciplinary technologies, such as biochips and biosensors, are promising for application in the future. For nondestructive techniques, convenient and effective chemometric models are crucial, and the development of portable devices based on these technologies for onsite monitoring is a future trend. Moreover, omics technologies, especially proteomics, are important methods in laboratory detection because they enable multispecies detection and unknown target screening by using mass spectrometry databases.

A PCR Method That Can Be Further Developed into PCR-RFLP Assay for Eight Animal Species Identification

There are many PCR-based methods for animal species identification; however, their detection numbers are limited or could not identify unknown species. We set out to solve this problem by developing a universal primer PCR assay for simultaneous identification of eight animal species, including goat, sheep, deer, buffalo, cattle, yak, pig, and camel. In this assay, the variable lengths of mitochondrial DNA were amplified using a pair of universal primers. PCR amplifications yielded 760 bp, 737 bp, 537 bp, 486 bp, 481 bp, 464 bp, 429 bp, and 359 bp length fragments for goat, sheep, deer, buffalo, cattle, yak, pig, and camel, respectively. This primer pair had no cross-reaction with other common domestic animals and fish. The limit of detection varied from 0.01 to 0.05 ng of genomic DNA for eight animal species in a 20 µl PCR mixture. Each PCR product could be further digested into fragments with variable sizes and qualitative analysis by SspI restriction enzyme. This developed PCR-RFLP assay was sufficient to distinguish all targeted species. Compared with the previous published related methods, this approach is simple, with high throughput, fast processing rates, and more cost-effective for routine identification of meat in foodstuffs.

A simple and sensitive two-tube multiplex PCR assay for simultaneous detection of ten meat species

A sensitive and reliable technique for meat species identification is required to prevent food adulteration, particularly in meat production. This work developed an optimized multiplex PCR assay for simultaneous identification of five commonly consumed and five commonly banned meat species in meat products. We designed primers that specifically amplified mitochondrial ATPase subunit 8 gene regions of different lengths of bovine, ovine, swine, chicken, turkey, cat, dog, mouse and human DNAs. The developed multiplex PCR assay proved to be specific, sensitive down to 30pg DNA per reaction, reproducible and economical. It could be used with a variety of raw meats and processed food samples and is easily applicable in a routine laboratory analysis without specific sophisticated equipment.

Development and validation of a universal primer pair for the simultaneous detection of eight animal species

In the present study, we developed a novel simplex PCR assay for the simultaneous detection of eight animal species, including goat, sheep, deer, buffalo, cattle, yak, pig and camel. A unique pair of universal primers was designed to target mitochondrial DNA variable regions in the eight animal species, generating, 787, 763, 563, 512, 507, 491, 455 and 385bp long fragments for goat, sheep, deer, buffalo, cattle, yak, pig and camel, respectively. The assay showed no cross-reactivity with other common domestic animals, and was validated by sequencing and enzyme digestion. Detection limit for DNA samples from the eight animal species varied between 6 and 20pg in a 20μl PCR mixture. Interestingly, the newly developed method successfully identified 170 commercial meat products, and is simple, fast, sensitive, specific, and cost-effective. Therefore, it could be used for the detection of goat, sheep, deer, buffalo, cattle, yak, pig, and camel species in foodstuffs.