Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2022 Dec 19;11(24):4098.
doi: 10.3390/foods11244098.

Effects of Storage Method on the Quality of Processed Sea Cucumbers (Apostichopus japonicus)

Shuang Li  1 , Yan Zhou  1 , Liming Sun  1 , Yanjie Wang  1 , Shuang Song  1 , Chunqing Ai  1 , Jingfeng Yang  1
Affiliations

Effects of Storage Method on the Quality of Processed Sea Cucumbers (Apostichopus japonicus)

Shuang Li et al. Foods. .

Abstract

This research aimed to establish an effective storage method to maintain the quality of processed sea cucumbers. In this study, sea cucumbers were stored by various methods including the storage of live sea cucumbers (seawater treatment, oxygen treatment, and ascorbic acid treatment) and the storage of dead sea cucumbers (frozen treatment). The sea cucumber quality was monitored after storage and boiling. The weightlessness rate and WHC of the frozen group increased to 86.96% ± 0.83% and 93.29% ± 0.32%, respectively. Frozen sea cucumbers shrunk with the meat's textural properties deteriorated. During the live sea cucumber storage, the tissue protein degraded from day 3 to day 7 which led to the promotion of TVB-N. Among these, the oxygen group showed the smallest TVB-N increase from day 0 (3.78 ± 0.60 mg 100 g-1) to day 7 (10.40 ± 0.12 mg 100 g-1). The oxygen group exhibited the most moderate change in weightlessness rate (4.24% ± 0.45%) and the most moderate texture parameters decline, such as the hardness of 32.52%, chewiness of 78.98 ± 5.10 N, and adhesion of 0.84 ± 0.00. The oxygen method showed the best condition of sea cucumber after 5 days of storage.

Keywords: ascorbic acid; oxygenation; protein degradation; sea cucumber; texture.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Exterior change of boiled sea cucumbers in different treatment groups during storage.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Sensory score of boiled sea cucumbers in different treatment groups during storage. Dates are presented as mean ± SD (n = 6). Different capital letters indicate significant differences in the average between groups. Different lowercase letters indicate significant differences in the average value within each group (p < 0.05).
Figure 3
Figure 3
The tissue slice of boiled sea cucumber after storage with different methods for 7 days. The slice was stained by V-G staining (100×).
Figure 4
Figure 4
Changes of the (A) hardness, (B) chewiness, (C) springiness, and (D) adhesiveness of boiled sea cucumber body wall (SCBW) in different treatment groups during storage. Dates are presented as mean ± SD (n = 6). Different capital letters indicate significant differences in the average between groups. Different lowercase letters indicate significant differences in the average value within each group (p < 0.05).
Figure 5
Figure 5
Changes of (A) weightlessness rate and (B) WHC of boiled SJBW in different treatment groups during storage. Dates are presented as mean ± SD (n = 3). Different capital letters indicate significant differences in the average between groups. Different lowercase letters indicate significant differences in the average value within each group (p < 0.05).
Figure 6
Figure 6
Changes in TVB-N in different treatment groups during storage. Dates are presented as mean ± SD (n = 6). Different capital letters indicate significant differences in the average between groups. Different lowercase letters indicate significant differences in the average value within each group (p < 0.05).
Figure 7
Figure 7
SDS-PAGE (5% Stacking gel and 8% separated gel) analysis of stored sea cucumbers protein by different treatments. (A) Electrophoretic diagram of SDS-PAGE and (B) quantitative analysis of electrophoresis. Relative expression = tropomyosin/ actin. Dates are presented as mean ± SD (n = 3). Different capital letters indicate significant differences in the average between groups. Different lowercase letters indicate significant differences in the average value within each group (p < 0.05).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Pangestuti R., Arifin Z. Medicinal and health benefit effects of functional sea cucumbers. J. Tradit. Complement. Med. 2018;8:341–351. doi: 10.1016/j.jtcme.2017.06.007. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. China Fishery Statistics Yearbook. China Agriculture Press; Beijing, China: 2022.
    1. Zhang M., Liu Y.X., Zhao G.H., Song L., Wu Z.X., Jiang P.F., Zhou D.Y., Zhu B.W. Studying on effects of boiling on texture, microstructure and physiochemical properties of sea cucumber body wall and its mechanism using second harmonic generation (SHG) microscopy. Food Chem. 2023;400:134055. doi: 10.1016/j.foodchem.2022.134055. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Duan X., Zhang M., Mujumdar A.S., Wang S. Microwave freeze drying of sea cucumber (Stichopus japonicus) J. Food Eng. 2010;96:491–497. doi: 10.1016/j.jfoodeng.2009.08.031. - DOI
    1. Wu H.T., Li D.M., Zhu B.W., Sun J.J., Zheng J., Wang F.L., Konno K., Jiang X. Proteolysis of noncollagenous proteins in sea cucumber, Stichopus japonicus, body wall: Characterisation and the effects of cysteine protease inhibitors. Food Chem. 2013;141:1287–1294. doi: 10.1016/j.foodchem.2013.03.088. - DOI - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources