PCR-RFLP ANALYSIS OF MITOCHONDRIAL-DNA FOR IDENTIFICATION OF SNAIL MEAT SPECIES

Several species of land snails, including Helix pomatia and Helix luco rum are consumed as food products. The main source of commercial compe tition is an imported African snail, Achatina fulica. The only way to distinguish between these species has been morphologically. We hypothe sized a reliable method for identifying canned snails could be based o n using PCR-RFLP analysis of mitochondrial DNA. The molecular weights of the amplified fragments were perfectly identical, regardless of low extraction (fresh snails or cooked and canned samples). The whole amp lified products (16S rRNA and 12S rRNA) made it possible to check any fraudulent label and identify the three species using four restriction enzymes (RFLP).