Abstract
An unpleasant odor was produced from the water extract of pork mixed with iron powder (extra pure grade) at room temperature. A main conponent of the unpleasant odor was found as H2 S which might possibly play an important role in enhancing the odor of other components. To investigate the formation mechanism of H2 S, various amino acid, amine and carbohydrate solutions were used, and remarkable rates of H2 S were found to be formed from cystine, cysteine, histidine monohydrochloride, citric acid and Na2 EDTA solutions by interacting with iron powder, respectively.
As hydrogen sulfide was formed not only from sulfur compounds, but also from non-sulfur compounds interacted with iron, it was interpreted that a part of precursor of H2 S might be the sulfur component contained in iron powder as impurity.
