The seventh edition of "Lawrie's meat science", written by Ralston Lawrie and David Ledward, will benefit meat processors who are anxious to keep profits up, at a time when meat is the number one cause of potentially-fatal diseases linked to food products worldwide.
According to Lawrie, meat producers now have an abundance of tools at hand that help them fight the food-borne pathogens that cause diseases such as Salmonella, E-coli and listeria.
As well as older processing methods such as high pressure, thermal treatment and ionizing radiation, Lawrie also explores newer technologies, such as DNA profiling.
"Greater understanding of animal DNA allows processors to analyse toxins produced by pathogenic micro-organisms", he says. It can also provide reliable ways of identifying a species, even in severely processed meat products," he added.
The testing of DNA has been made easier in recent times thanks to the emerging technologies of nanotechnology and bioinformatics, two molecular-level sciences both examined in the guide.
Bioinformatics involves using a range of scientific techniques to solve biological problems on the molecular level, Lawrie said.
In particular, processors can use this technique to map and monitor all of the proteins present in a particular product or animal species.
Nanotechnology, on the other hand, allows processors to control matter at the molecular level, Lawrie says, enabling them to spot and control product defects that are invisible at more conventional dimensions.
According to the authors, putting pathogen-spotting technology in place need not eat into company profits, as slaughter methods are being developed by the meat industry that produce higher quality products for lower cost.
One such technique discussed in the guide is 'muscle-profiling', used in the US to slaughter animals and cut up the meat according to the muscle's properties such as leanness, colour, pH balance and water holding capacity.
According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the meat industry is in constant need of new technologies to fight pathogens, as occurrences of food borne diseases are on the rise.
In the EU, there were 192,703 reported cases of salmonella across the 25 member states in 2004.
In the US, an estimated 76 million cases of food-borne illnesses occur each year, causing about 325,000 hospitalizations and 5,000 deaths.
The CDC identified 17,252 laboratory-confirmed cases of food poisoning in 2006, including 6,655 cases of salmonella and 590 cases of E-coli O157. In 2005, 16,614 cases were identified, rising from 15,806 in 2004.
Regulatory measures put in place by the EU include Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) principles, which assess hazards and establish control systems that focus on prevention rather than end-product testing, and rapid alert systems signalling if a food product poses a risk to the human food chain.
Publication: Lawrie's meat science - seventh edition. Editor: R. A. Lawrie. Publisher: Woodhead Publishing in Food Science, Technology and Nutrition.
