Comparison and relationship between meat colour and antioxidant capacity of different pig breeds

Abstract

The objectives of this study were to evaluate meat colour, antioxidant performance of longissimus muscle in different pig breeds, including five Chinese native pig breeds, a Chinese bred pig breed as well as a commercial crossbred pig breed, and to analyse the relationships between meat colour and antioxidant capacity. The results showed that the Chinese native and bred pig breeds have higher meat colour and marbling scores than commercial crossbred pigs. The Chinese native and bred pig breeds showed significantly stronger total antioxidant capacity and superoxide dismutase activity, and lower malondialdehyde contents than commercial crossbred pigs. Moreover, the total antioxidant capacity, superoxide dismutase activity were positively correlated with visual colour, a* and chroma, and negatively correlated with L* and hue angle; on the contrary, the malondialdehyde content was negatively correlated with visual colour, marbling, a*, b* and chroma, and positively correlated with L* and hue angle. In addition, principal component 1 and 2 explained 46.41% and 18.30% of the total variance. These results indicated that meat colour and antioxidant capacity were affected by pig breeds, and meat colour was strongly correlated with antioxidant capacity.