Spotting fake frankfurters

Among products whose content can be difficult to determine are hotdogs, an all-time favorite in many countries. Frankfurter fraud has led consumers to eat that which they shouldn’t on the basis of their diet, religion or culture. To help prevent it, scientists have devised a scientific method which they shared in a report in ACS' Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.

Currently, testing the authenticity of a meat product involves sampling its DNA, amplifying the genetic material with the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and looking for certain markers. But existing methods often only search for one, long DNA sequence, which could break down during food processing and lead to false results. Md. Eaqub Ali and colleagues wanted to come up with a more reliable approach.

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The researchers developed a technique to look for pairs of short DNA sequences from beef, buffalo and pork in hot dogs. They used their approach on 20 beef franks that they bought in markets in Malaysia, where the researchers are based. Testing showed their target sequences were stable under food processing conditions. The researchers also found that all of the hot dogs labeled as "beef" also contained buffalo meat. The authors acknowledge funding from the University of Malaya.

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