foods Article A Proteomic Study for the Discovery of Beef Tenderness Biomarkers and Prediction of Warner–Bratzler Shear Force Measured on Longissimus thoracis Muscles of Young Limousin-Sired Bulls Yao Zhu 1,2,† , Mohammed Gagaoua 1,† , Anne Maria Mullen 1, Alan L. Kelly 2, Torres Sweeney 3 , Jamie Cafferky 1 , Didier Viala 4 and Ruth M. Hamill 1,* 1 Food Quality and Sensory Science Department, Teagasc Food Research Centre, Ashtown, D15 KN3K Dublin 15, Ireland;
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[email protected] (M.G.);
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[email protected] (J.C.) 2 School of Food and Nutritional Sciences, University College Cork, T12 K8AF Cork, Ireland;
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[email protected] 4 Metabolomic and Proteomic Exploration Facility (PFEM), INRAE, F-63122 Saint-Genès-Champanelle, France;
[email protected] * Correspondence:
[email protected]; Tel.: +353-(0)1-805-9933 † Both authors contributed equally to this work. Abstract: Beef tenderness is of central importance in determining consumers’ overall liking. To better Citation: Zhu, Y.; Gagaoua, M.; understand the underlying mechanisms of tenderness and be able to predict it, this study aimed Mullen, A.M.; Kelly, A.L.; Sweeney, T.; to apply a proteomics approach on the Longissimus thoracis (LT) muscle of young Limousin-sired Cafferky, J.; Viala, D.; Hamill, R.M. A bulls to identify candidate protein biomarkers. A total of 34 proteins showed differential abundance Proteomic Study for the Discovery of between the tender and tough groups.