ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Nutr.
Sec. Nutrition and Food Science Technology
This article is part of the Research TopicMachine Learning Applications in Multi-Category Food Nutritional AssessmentView all articles
Assessment of beef qualitity changes during by using dynamic stress method based on contactless airflow-optical technique
Provisionally accepted
- 1College of Forestry, Northwest A and F University, Xianyang, China
- 2China Agricultural University, Beijing, China
- 3Northwest A&F University, Yangling, China
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Introduction: In the present study, the airflow–optical detection technique was evaluated as a novel, contactless approach for assessing dynamic viscoelastic changes in beef during storage. Understanding the viscoelastic behavior of meat is essential for monitoring its quality, as changes in mechanical properties are closely linked to biochemical and structural alterations during storage. Methods: Beef apparent dynamic viscoelastic parameters, including apparent storage modulus and apparent loss modulus, were measured using the developed airflow–optical detection device. Concurrently, key quality attributes—total volatile basic nitrogen (TVB-N) content and Warner-Bratzler shear force (WBSF)—were determined through standard physicochemical analyses. Partial least squares regression (PLSR) models were constructed to predict beef freshness and tenderness based on the collected strain data. Results: During storage, TVB-N content of beef increased gradually, while WBSF values decreased, accompanied by a rise in apparent viscosity. This resulted in a significant increase in the apparent loss modulus (from 9.43 × 10² ± 267.45 to 1.95 × 10³ ± 9662.65 Pa), whereas the apparent storage modulus remained largely unchanged. The PLSR models showed satisfactory predictive performance: for TVB-N, the prediction set achieved a correlation coefficient (R) of 0.736 with a root mean square error (RMSE) of 1.262 mg/100 g; for WBSF, the prediction set yielded R = 0.741 with RMSE = 1.598 N. Conclusion: These findings demonstrate that the airflow–optical detection technique can effectively capture dynamic viscoelastic changes in beef and provide reliable predictions of key quality parameters. The approach offers a promising, non-destructive tool for real-time monitoring of meat freshness and tenderness during storage.
Keywords: Airflow, apparent viscoelasticity, Beef quality, Optical, storage
Received: 18 Nov 2025; Accepted: 30 Jan 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Su, Tang, Yang, Fenglan and He. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Yuan Su
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