THE VIDEO IMAGE-ANALYSIS FOR THE MEASUREM ENT OF RELEVANT QUALITY TRAITS OF BEEF

The recently developed technique for objective evaluation of marbling using automatic image analysis which is described here makes it possib le to measure image analysis parameters which represent essential char acteristics of the intramuscular fat deposits in meat. This permits de tailed comparisons of different samples which provide much mole inform ation than the marbling points which have previosly been established s ubjectively or the fat content determined by chemical means. As an ini tial area of application, this technique was used to investigate the i ntramuscular fat deposits in samples of beef from different breeds of cattle.