Quantifying changes in tenderness during storage of beef

An exponential decay equation was used to quantify changes in beef toughness during storage at constant temperatures between 0° and 20°C. Temperature had the greatest effect on tenderising rate—thirty-two times that due to animals and ten times that due to muscles which were M. longissimus dorsi, M. psoas major and M. semitendinosus. A common rate constant, derived at each temperature, showed that an increment in rate produced by a 5°C rise in storage temperature was then detectable and that the enthalpy of activation (ΔH¹) was 76 kJ/mole. Toughness constants differed most between muscles.