One of the things I enjoy about being involved with the Journal of Aquatic Food Product Technology is the opportunity to see research come through that causes us to think a bit out of the box. In this issue, there is an article, Impact of chitosan-based coatings on myofibrillar protein denaturation, muscle microstructure and lipid oxidation of oyster (Crassostrea hongkongensis) during 0 ºC storage, that actually takes a deep dive on the changes that occur in oyster myofibrillar protein and microstructure. Yes, my fellow researchers, oysters have myofibrillar protein! I have to say, I’ve have seen many, many papers use the approaches applied by the authors on fish muscle, especially processed fish muscle such as surimi and surimi seafood. When I saw this paper, I came to the surprising realization that this is the first time I have seen anyone apply these protein characterization techniques to oyster muscle. I actually took a quick sneak peek at Google Scholar to see if I could even find any papers focused on oyster muscle structure changes as opposed to microbiological, sensory, or chemical assessments. As expected, every one of the very few papers I found on oyster quality had a strong focus on characterizing just the microbial changes in oysters. Kudos to these authors for providing a new approach and also taking the bold step of trying to understand the functional changes occurring in the oyster muscle. This is something I truly feel we have a dearth of knowledge and understanding and deserves more attention.
Enjoy learning more about oyster muscle in this edition; spoiler alert: there are pretty significant changes occurring at 0º C!
Christina DeWitt,
Co-Editor-in-Chief
Oregon State University Coastal Oregon Marine Experiment Station, Astoria, OR, USA [email protected] http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4512-5029