Quiz 5

Trevor Lee
Dec 5, 2016
2 min read

Quiz 5.

DUE DEC 5.

Describe wooden breast and white striping Myopathies in poultry and their impact on meat quality. 20 Points.

To describe woody breast syndrome, from my experiences on internships, it is commonly seen in broiler breast, especially older broilers at nine pounds. The syndrome itself causes the top portion of the breast, near the neck, to become as hard as a rock and sometime white in color with excess or enlarged growth of white stripping (collagen and connective tissue) at the top of the breats and laterally down the breast. When cooked, the breast is hard to chew and very unpleasing making very undesirable to consumers. The white stripping is not a normal standard for how broiler breast should look like to consumers, therefore consumers will reject the white striping breast at stores. Furthermore, this creates loss of revenue and headaches for companies.

In the Spring of 2016, I had the privilege to work under Dr. Jessica Starkey on her lab research team, whom is studying muscle biology and stem cell development in woody breast. We performed two trials, one tested a nutrition value in feed formulation and the other tested incubation changes. Both, in which, are related to woody breast. Disclaimer: I am not allowed to reveal any test results from the trails. The point is, many researchers and scientist have different theories and inputs on how woody breast syndrome is developed, examples: stress, genetics, feed, lighting, grow-out time, incubation and so on. Not one scientist has found the ‘cure’ to the syndrome but majority believes because we have breed to grow fast and put as much meat n the bird as possible has created this problem.

However, maybe the answer is not finding the prevention of the woody breast but the cure is during the cooking process. Maybe a certain step or treatment of the woody breast can cause denaturation of proteins causing the meat to soften and return to normal meat quality.

Please email me of any possible corrections to this passage. Thank you and have a Merry Christmas!