Welcome to another edition of eChook!
The hen’s egg contains many essential nutrients, as it is a “self-contained unit” for starting a new life! Indeed, the egg is a major food source, supplying good quality, balanced nutrients to billions of people. For example, the world’s total hen egg production in 2011 was 70.5 million tonnes (FAO 2013), which is 8 million tonnes more than beef production for the same year.
In the developed world, particularly from the mid-1990s onwards, consumers have become more fastidious about the food they eat. For the global poultry industry, this consumer focus has resulted in a great deal of research into egg quality.
Recently, the Poultry CRC organised a workshop to compile and contextualise the part of this research relating to egg albumin quality. The key contributor to the workshop was Dr Yves Nys from Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA), France.
In this edition, I am delighted to introduce a review arising from the workshop. Entitled “How to Control Albumin Quality: state of the art, recent developments and putative innovation” by Dr Yeves Nys and Dr Nicolas Guyot. The review comprehensively discusses the fundamental science of the structure and characteristics of albumin, as well as albumin quality aspects related to production, storage and processing. Recent advances in albumin quality research are also covered. By way of background, Dr Nys is the lead author for a two-volume book called “Improving the safety and quality of eggs and egg products”.
In Australia, a hard copy of the review is available on request from the Poultry CRC. Please contact Mr Mick Warner on (02) 6773 3767 or at mwarner@poultrycrc.com.au
Mingan
