Utilization of Ascidian, Halocynthia roretzi -4. Browning of Ascidian meat, Halocynthia roretzi and Its Prevention-

Browning of ascidian, Halocynthia roretzi, meat occurres very rapidly when skinned off or cut during processing and it resulted the quality loss of fresh frozen, dehydrated or fermented products. In this study, the causes of color development and prevention of browning were experimented. The browning of ascidian meat may be occurred enzymatically by a tyrosinase contained in meat and viscera which acted specifically on L-tyrosine as a substrate rather than on catechol. Activity of the enzyme in viscera was three times higher than in meat. The optimum pH and temperature on the tyrosinase activity of crude enzyme obtained from ascidian was 6.0 and , respectively. The enzyme was inactivated heating at for 3 minutes or for 1 minute and it was inhibited by solutions at ascorbic acid, sodium hydrogen sulfite, cystein, citric acid, cyanide but only sodium hydrogen sulfite treatment was effective to retard such a high content of enzyme as in case of viscera. In practical use for processing of ascidian meat browning was retarded by dipping the viscera removed ascidian meat in 0.2M citric acid for 5 minutes or sodium hydrogen sulfite solution for 1 minute resulting in sulfur dioxide residue less than 100 ppm.