Detection of Mink (Mustela vison) DNA in Meat Products using Polymerase Chitin Reaction PCR Assay

The study was to develop a Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) assay for specific detection of mink meat using designed pairs of primers based on mitochondrial D-loop. Mink meat is used as fraud ingredients of false mutton or dog-meat in meat markets. This study was conducted to establish Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) method for the sensitive and specific detection of mink (Mustela vison) DNA in meat products. Six pairs of primers were designed from. tandem repeat region of D-loop in mitochondria after alignment of the available sequences in the GenBank database. The specific pair of primers chosen from the six designed pairs by PCR generated specific fragments of 343 bp in length for mink. The specificity of detection was conducted with DNA samples of mink, blue fox, dog, raccoon dog, swine, sheep. Then amplification of positive reaction was observed only in mink species. In this study, no adverse effects of cooking and autoclaving were found on amplification of mink DNA fragments. Then the detection limit was found to be less than 1% in mixed meat products. The PCR method described in this study proved to be very sensitive and reliable in mink DNA identification. Thus, it could be considered as a further improvement method for the detection of mink DNA in meat products processed under different manufacturing conditions.