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Effects of genetic and environmental factors on muscle glycogen content in J apanese B lack cattle
Author(s) -
Komatsu Tomohiko,
Shoji Noriaki,
Saito Kunihiko,
Suzuki Keiichi
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
animal science journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.606
H-Index - 38
eISSN - 1740-0929
pISSN - 1344-3941
DOI - 10.1111/asj.12201
Subject(s) - palatability , glycogen , marbled meat , monosaccharide , food science , heritability , zoology , biology , chemistry , biochemistry , genetics
Monosaccharides such as glucose contribute to the development of meat flavor upon heating via the M aillard reaction; therefore, monosaccharide content is related to beef palatability. Here, we analyzed the effects of genetic and environmental factors on the content of glycogen, one of the precursors of monosaccharides, in the muscles of 958 fattened J apanese B lack cattle from Y amagata P refecture. Analysis of variance showed that muscle glycogen content was affected by the farm and postmortem periods, but not by sex, slaughter age, slaughter month or number of days detained at the slaughter yard. Additionally, consumption of digestible brown rice feed elevated muscle glycogen levels. Glycogen heritability was estimated to be 0.34, and genetic correlations between glycogen and carcass weight ( CW ) or beef marbling standard ( BMS ) were weak. The predicted breeding values varied among paternal lines. These results demonstrated that genetic factors might improve muscle glycogen content and therefore beef palatability, but do not influence CW or BMS .