Changes in Muscle Quality of Wuchang Bream during Live Transportation

The changes in the muscle quality of Wuchang bream during live transportation (3, 6, 12 and 24 h) were measured by ultra-high performance liquid chromatography, a color difference meter and an ultraviolet spectrophotometer. The results showed that after 3 h of transportation, the pH value, water-holding capacity, whiteness, brightness (L*), redness (a*), and the contents of lactic acid, muscle glycogen, ATP and its derivatives in fish muscle were 6.57, 70.33%, 52.22, 52.27, 0.29, 4.50 mg/g, 1.46 mg/g and 909.25 mg/100 g, respectively. With increasing transportation time to 24 h, the pH value first increased and then decreased to 6.33 (P < 0.05), while the lactic acid content initially decreased and then increased to 3.81 mg/g (P < 0.05). The water-holding capacity gradually increased to 76.05% and then decreased to 73.33%. The whiteness and L* gradually decreased to 47.64 and 47.71, respectively, whereas a* increased to 1.31 (P < 0.05). The content of muscle glycogen gradually decreased to 1.25 mg/g. The total content of ATP and its derivatives increased to 1116.62 mg/100 g; the ATP content decreased to 62.43 mg/100 g, while the content of the umami substance IMP increased to 747.91 mg/100 g, and the contents of the bitter substances inosine (HxR) and hypoxanthine (Hx) increased to 156.12 and 63.28 mg/100 g, respectively. It was concluded that the muscle quality of Wuchang bream changed significantly during live transportation under the influence of stress.