Heritability estimates of meat sensory characteristics are a function of the number of panellists and their inter-correlations

Genome-wide association study for meat tenderness in beef cattle identifies patterns of the genetic contribution in different post-mortem stages

The beef tenderization process during the post-mortem period is one of the most important sensorial attributes and it is well-established. The aim of this study was to identify the genetic contribution pattern to meat tenderness at 7-(LMD7), 14-(LMD14), and 21-(LMD21) days post-mortem. The heritabilities for LMD7 (0.194), LMD14 (0.142) and LMD21 (0.048) are well established in the population evaluated here. However, its genetic contribution in terms of genomic candidate regions is still poorly understood. Tenderness was measured in the Longissiums thoracis using Warner-Bratzler shear force in the three post-mortem periods. A total of 4323 crossbred beef cattle were phenotyped and genotyped using the Illumina BovineSNP50K. The percentage of the total genetic variance was estimated using the weighted single-step genomic best linear unbiased prediction method. The main candidate windows for LMD7 were associated with proteolysis of myofibrillar structures and the weakening endomysium and perimysium. Candidate windows for LMD14 and LMD21 were mapped in bovine QTLs for body composition, height and growth. Results presented herein highlight, the largest contribution of proteolysis related processes before 14-days post-mortem and body composition characteristics in later stages for meat tenderness.

Inter-animal genetic variability exist in organoleptic properties of prime beef meat

The objective of the present study was to estimate genetic parameters for four organoleptic traits in beef meat, namely tenderness, juiciness, flavour and chewiness using data from 5380 young crossbred progeny of 748 different sires. As well as using the mean animal sensory score across all panellists for a given trait, other aggregate functions such as the median and modal values were also investigated. The heritability (SE) of mean tenderness, juiciness, flavour and chewiness was 0.16 (0.04), 0.14 (0.04), 0.11 (0.03) and 0.21 (0.06), respectively; heritability estimates for the other aggregate values of these traits were generally lower. All genetic correlations between tenderness, juiciness and flavour were positive (0.52 to 0.68) while the genetic correlations between these three traits with chewiness were all negative varying from -0.95 to -0.48. Weak genetic correlations (≤|0.16|) were evident between the sensory traits and all of carcass weight, conformation and subcutaneous fat cover.