Biogenic Amines in Fish and Fish Products

Biogenic amines are compounds forming decarboxylation of free-amino acids in the food. Histamine, cadaverine, putrescine, tyramine, spermidine and spermine are biogenic amines that often found in food. In particular, fish and fish products have great importance in terms of formation of biogenic amines. Amount of biogenic amines is rapidly increasing with the microbial decarboxylase activity in these products. This formation is accelerated by various factors such as poor hygiene, contamination, microbial load of the raw materials and temperature. Cold storage and processing of fish and fish products are the most effective method to preventing the formation of biogenic amines. Furthermore, the amount of biogenic amine can be reduced by various methods such as irradiation, curing, modified atmosphere packaging and vacuum packaging. In this paper, biogenic amines that occur in fish and fish products, occurrence causes and methods of prevention of biogenic amines have been analyzed.