Takagi S et al. (2020), Quantification of the Flavor and Taste of Gonad...

ECB-ART-49434

Sensors (Basel) 2020 Dec 08;2024:. doi: 10.3390/s20247008.

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Quantification of the Flavor and Taste of Gonads from the Sea Urchin Mesocentrotus nudus Using GC-MS and a Taste-Sensing System.

Takagi S , Sato Y , Murata Y , Kokubun A , Touhata K , Ishida N , Agatsuma Y .

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Sea urchin gonads are a delicious seafood item of high commercial value. Our past studies have revealed that the gonads of the sea urchin Mesocentrotus nudus fed the basal frond portion of fresh Saccharina kelp (BS) or the sporophylls of fresh Undaria (SU) during May-July are of high-quality. The present study investigated the flavor and taste of BS and SU gonads in comparison with those from non-fed M. nudus (NF) using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) and gas chromatography (GC)-sniffing techniques, and a taste-sensing system. Data of the estimated intensity of taste (EIT) were compared with assessment of gonads from M. nudus collected from an Eisenia bed (fishing ground) and a barren in July. Gonads from both BS and SU released pleasant green, sour, and fruity aromas characteristic of butyl acetate, which are here recognized essential flavor components of high-quality gonads. The gonads of BS and SU had a strong umami taste compared to those of NF, and the Eisenia bed and the barren. The most marketable M. nudus gonads were assessed to be those with green and fruity aromas from butyl acetate, sweet aroma from benzaldehyde, umami EIT > 13.8, bitterness EIT < 3.1, and without any unpleasant sulfurous odor from sulfur-containing compounds.

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References [+] :

Kobayashi, Advanced taste sensors based on artificial lipids with global selectivity to basic taste qualities and high correlation to sensory scores. 2010, Pubmed

	Figure 1. Sushi made with Mesocentrotus nudus gonads, which were evaluated as high-quality by a chef from a sushi restaurant with a Michelin 3-star rating in Tokyo (photo by S. Takagi).
	Figure 2. Chromatograms of odor-active organic compounds in the gonads of Mesocentrotus nudus using gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (N = 3). BS, SU and NF indicate sea urchins fed with the basal frond portions of Saccharina japonica, sporophylls of Undaria pinnatifida and no food, respectively. Compounds are identified by peak numbers, as shown in Table 1.
	Figure 3. Estimated intensity of taste (EIT) of gonads of Mesocentrotus nudus fed experimentally or obtained directly from the wild. Experimentally fed: BS, fed with the basal frond portions of Saccharina japonica; SU, sporophylls of Undaria pinnatifida; NF, no food. Wild sea urchins: “Barren”, collected from a seabed barren; “Eisenia bed”, from an Eisenia bicyclis bed. Bars indicate mean EIT ± SE. Lower-case letters indicate more than one-unit difference in each EIT among groups, indicating a recognizable difference in taste by humans [30].