Characteristics of “MANDAI” （opah：Lampris guttatus） as a fish ingredient and a source of balenin

Abstract

Providing foods which can maintain and improve our health is an important issue for both developed and developing countries today. Fish and marine products are known as those effective foods. People have been eating fish for a long time. And its high quality protein, lower calories and improving brain function have attracted our attentions.

“MANDAI” (opah: Lampris guttatus), the fish that we handle, is mainly landed as a bycatch of tuna. The meat color, texture and taste of “MANDAI” is similar to those of tuna, so that it has been eaten by us for years. Recent research has shown that it contains high amount of balenine, a type of imidazole dipeptide. Balenine, however, compared to carnosine and anserine which are found in livestock, bonito and tuna, is still a minor nutrition. For that reason, balenine has not been studied much. In order to show that “MANDAI” is a useful source of balenin for research, we investigated some states of balenine in it.

First, we studied the distribution of balenine in its whole body and found that normal muscle is suitable for extract production. Also, we found out that it is important to check the color of the muscle, in order to obtain a stable concentration of balenine in the extract. Furthermore, we have found an effective knowledge for the production of high purity balenine. At the same time, the optical purity of the balenine from “MANDAI” was almost the same as that of the commercial standard. These results reveal that “MANDAI” is a promising material for future functional research of balenine.