Potential of novel cadaverine biosensor technology to predict shelf life of chilled yellowfin tuna (Thunnus albacares)

A considerable amount of fresh fish is wasted, due to imprecise
shelf life estimations that lead to relatively short use-by dates. This
study aimed at evaluating a newly developed sensor measuring cadaverine
headspace concentrations, as a rapid and precise measure to estimate
within a realistic DK retail scenario freshness and shelf life of
imported tuna loins.
To achieve this the cadaverine concentration as measured by liquid
chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC- MS/MS) in tuna steaks from
different biological replicas undergoing storage at 2 °C, were associated
to the freshness states and shelf life as determined by the Quality Index
Method (QIM) and microbial measurements. The cadaverine sensor responses
of tuna stored under the same conditions were compared to the validated
LC-MS/MS concentrations and benchmarked towards the QIM and microbial
counts estimation of shelf life.
The results indicated that the novel cadaverine biosensor allowed an
estimation of freshness and transition of acceptable to unacceptable
quality of the tuna steaks comparable to other methods such as LC-MS/MS
determination of cadaverin, QIM and determination of microbiological
counts. The composition of the microbiological flora during storage,
consisted mainly of Pseudomonas fragi but also other Pseudomonas spp,
Vibrio spp., Brochothrix thermosphacta, H2S producing bacteria and
Enterobacteriaceae, the latter only in relatively low numbers. The novel
biosensor technology appear to be a promising rapid and cost efficient
method for evaluating freshness of several types of fish products in
addition to fresh tuna, which will support the sustainability of the fish
industry.