Will Your Fish Fillet Soon Carry a DNA Barcode?
- Posted on November 28, 2011 at 10:40am by
Liz Klimas
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CANBERRA, Australia (The Blaze/AP) — Last month, The Boston Globe released the findings of its investigation into local restaurants and the fish they served. It found that only half of the nearly 200 fish samples were identified correctly, meaning customers were often duped and over charged for the fillet that actually made it onto their plates.
Now to combat this problem, restaurants around the world will soon use new DNA technology to assure patrons they are being served the genuine fish fillet or caviar they ordered, rather than inferior substitutes, an expert in genetic identification says.
In October, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration officially approved so-called DNA barcoding — a standardized fingerprint that can identify a species like a supermarket scanner reads a barcode — to prevent the mislabeling of both locally produced and imported seafood in the United States. Other national regulators around the world are also considering adopting DNA barcoding as a fast, reliable and cost-effective tool for identifying organic matter.
Check out this San Fransico ABC 7 news report from earlier this year about creating the DNA database for fish:
David Schindel, a Smithsonian Institution paleontologist and executive secretary of the Washington-based Consortium for the Barcode of Life, said he has started discussions with the restaurant industry and seafood suppliers about using the technology as a means of certifying the authenticity of delicacies.
“When they sell something that’s really expensive, they want the consumer to believe that they‘re getting what they’re paying for,” Schindel told The Associated Press.
“We’re going to start seeing a self-regulating movement by the high-end trade embracing barcoding as a mark of quality,” he said.
Here’s the process of essentially how DNA barcoding works:
(Image: Barcode of Life)
While it would never be economically viable to DNA test every fish, it would be possible to test a sample of several fish from a trawler load, he said.
Schindel is organizer of the biennial International Barcode of Life Conference, which is being held Monday in the southern Australian city of Adelaide. The fourth in the conference series brings together 450 experts in the field to discuss new and increasingly diverse applications for the science.
Applications range from discovering what Australia‘s herd of 1 million feral camels feeds on in the Outback to uncovering fraud in Malaysia’s herbal drug industry.
Schindel leads a consortium of scientists from almost 50 nations in overseeing the compilation of a global reference library for the Earth’s 1.8 million known species.
The Barcode of Life Database so far includes more than 167,000 species. FISH-BOL — the Fish Barcode of Life Initiative — has more than 8,000 species barcoded.
Mislabeling is widespread in the seafood industry and usually involves cheaper types of fish being sold as more expensive varieties. A pair of New York high school students using DNA barcoding of food stocked in their own kitchens found in a 2009 study that caviar labeled as sturgeon was actually Mississippi paddlefish.
In a published study a year earlier, another pair of students from the high school found that one-fourth of fish samples they had collected around New York were incorrectly labeled as higher-priced fish.
Mislabeling of fish — which account for almost half the world’s vertebrate species — also poses risks to human health and the environment.
In 2007, several people became seriously ill from eating illegally imported toxic pufferfish from China that had been mislabeled as monkfish to circumvent U.S. import restrictions. Endangered species are also sold as more common fish varieties.
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ENTP
Posted on November 29, 2011 at 5:54pmI recently saw on the history channel a show about a German? Sub that was sunk that had around 1800 huge bottles filled with mercury and it was sunk in the ocean… they found the sub & the mercury had long ago spilled out into the sea floor bottom, they took a sea floor sample and it was Horribly contaminated. I just wonder how much mercury I’ve consumed in my life : ( My sister eats Sushi almost every freakin day, I‘m sure she’s contaminated.
Report Post »ENTP
Posted on November 29, 2011 at 6:00pmfound the story on Wiki, it states:
Report Post »In March 2003, the Royal Norwegian Navy minesweeper KNM Tyr, alerted by local fishermen, found the wreck.[7] An expedition to gather more detail by sonar mapping of the seafloor was mounted in October 2003.[8] The wreck was in two major sections, fore and aft, with the center section missing, including the conning tower. Further analysis was performed with a remotely operated underwater vehicle (ROV) in August 2005, locating an additional 107 pieces of vessel debris in the area, likely parts of the exploded center section.[8] The mercury, contained in 1,857 rusting steel bottles located down in the vessel’s keel, was found to be leaking out and currently poses a severe environmental threat (see mercury poisoning and Minamata disease).
So far 4 kilograms (8.8 lb) per year of mercury is leaking out into the surrounding environment, resulting in high levels of contamination in cod, torsk and edible crab around the wreck.[9] Boating and fishing near the wreck has been prohibited.
THE STORY ON THE HISTORY CHANNEL SHOWED ALL THE BOTTLES HAD LEAKED…
Wolf
Posted on November 29, 2011 at 9:03amI already know what kind of fish I eat- fresh and identified by myself as I put them on the stringer.
Report Post »As to those eating fish in restraunts- the majority wouldn’t kow what they were eating even if it was identified.
pamela kay
Posted on November 29, 2011 at 2:10amThis is a very slippery slope indeed. I don’t like or trust it. How do we no that it is safe or that it won’t be a means to cause health hazzards to those who consume them?
Report Post »SgtB
Posted on November 29, 2011 at 4:51pmIt isn’t anything they do to the fish crazy. What they want to do is to find an already present genetic marker that is species specific and use the base pairings as a kind of barcode. This is far less problematic than Monsanto actually genetically modifying our food crops with genes from ecoli and other bacteria.
What we should find fault with here is that the USDA and FDA exist and that they will be the ones implementing this test. We should not be funding things like this with taxpayer dollars. If there is really a big enough problem with correctly identified fish then there will be market value in having your fish certified by a third party with the technology or know how to do so. Then a restaurant of producer can say that all their meat is certified by so and so and charge more for the extra quality control.
PS. The idiots who mistook puffer fish for monk fish should probably stick to the basics like tuna, trout, and salmon.
Report Post »Stoic one
Posted on November 28, 2011 at 1:11pmDNA instant readers WILL become a reality. Just look at the evolution of car computer diagnostics tools should tell ya this. As pointed out in the article this will start out at the high end of the market, just like home computers did, or for that matter car computer diagnostic tools (both of which can be acquired for less than $100 for basic ones).
Report Post »Ruler4You
Posted on November 28, 2011 at 1:47pmYou are correct, this will be reality. I hope I’m long gone by then, though.
Report Post »TheVoice1
Posted on November 28, 2011 at 2:21pmDNA readers from fish to us…. hummmm…..
Report Post »Dabldo
Posted on November 28, 2011 at 8:34pmDNA instant reader is about the only way that this is gonna stop. But then theirs that slippery slope…..
Report Post »JLGunner
Posted on November 28, 2011 at 1:07pmI hope it’s bisquit and gravy flavored
Report Post »SgtB
Posted on November 29, 2011 at 4:54pmUGH! Did you even read the story or watch the video? They aren’t genetically modifying fish like Monsanto does to your corn, soy, and every other mass produced crop.
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