CORRECTION FOR BASE-LINE DRIFTING IN PROBE MEASUREMENTS OF CONNECTIVE-TISSUE IN BEEF

A UV fiber-optic probe has been developed to measure the collagen content of meat as an aid to meat grading. This experiment showed how to correct for a bias caused by drifting of the UV source intensity. Meat with a low collagen content and weak relative fluorescence was strongly excited while meat with a high collagen content and strong relative fluorescence was weakly excited. The resulting bias, which reversed the true pattern of relative fluorescence, was only partly cancelled by scaling the data (dividing by the fluorescence minimum of each sample). The numbers and widths of the fluorescence peaks were not restored to their true values, possibly because of a complex interaction between UV intensity and fluorescence quenching. But various indices relating to fluorescence intensity were corrected by scaling. Since these are the most useful for the prediction of collagen content, scaling of the data may eliminate the need for exact standardization of probes in industrial use.