EVALUATION OF MEAT AND BLOOD MEAL RATIOS IN MIXED PROTEIN MEALS BY VIS-NIR SPECTROSCOPY.

Only properly prepared animal by-products, protein meals can be utilized as animal feed additive. However, different protein meals are appropriate for feeding different animal species. Since the link between feeding ruminant-derived meat and bone meal (MBL) and the occurrence of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) and its human equivalent variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) has been established, it is imperative that potentially infective material is excluded from the food chain. Thus the aim of this study is to develop a spectral method which will allow to estimate the ratio of meat and blood protein meal in the final product. Consequently of the method is applicable to identify the purity meat and blood meal. During the test the products were mixed in different proportions and were examined by the spectral method. Measurements were conducted with AvaSpec 2048 spectrometer in visible (VIS) and in near infrared (NIR) wavelength range (400-1000 nm) to define the spectral differentiation of the different meal products. Significant difference can be detected in spectral reflectance between the meat and blood product in the VIS-NIR range. The blood product has a characteristic spectral property: in the range of600 and 735 nm reflectance values are increasing following a sigmoid curve. Beside the inflection points, based on the sensitive wavelength range VKFI (R930/R600) is produced for detecting protein meal purity. Furthermore, the integral of the reflectance curve at the sensitive spectral range is found to be also a good solution for the monitoring of purity. Inflection point of meat meal and blood product are also determined. As a result, the range of wavelength can be determined, which is suitable for detecting individual characteristics of the investigated products. Using spectral examination for determining composition of the products could be quick and low energy method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]