Maria Font i Furnols

Maria Font i Furnols
IRTA Institute of Agrifood Research and Technology | IRTA · Product Quality Programme

About

197
Publications
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Introduction
Skills and Expertise
Additional affiliations
January 1996 - present
Institut de Recerca i Tecnologia Agroalimentàries

Publications

Publications (197)
Article
Wooden breast (WB), spaghetti meat (SM) and white striping (WS) are significant research focuses due to their impact on meat quality. This study examines the relationship between different myopathies in chickens from a commercial slaughterhouse and compares physicochemical traits between breasts with single and multiple myopathies and control (CO-n...
Article
This study assessed the effect of boning processing method (hot vs. cold) on pork belly morphological and mechanical traits and the evolution of these traits during refrigerated storage postmortem (PM). A total of 14 crossbred pigs were slaughtered and their carcasses and bellies processed under two conditions: hot boning (n = 14, right sides of ca...
Article
This study presents a case of processing X‐ray computed tomography (CT) data for pork scans using chemometric latent space modeling. The distribution of voxel intensities is shown to exemplify a multivariate, multi‐collinear signal mixture. While this concept is not novel, it is revisited here from a chemometric perspective. To extract meaningful i...
Article
Full-text available
Although replacement of fat with fiber is a good strategy to avoid boar taint on high‐fat content products, as sausages, the final purchase intention is related to other external factors such as welfare and healthiness. So, the aim of this study was to evaluate the consumers' perception of sausages with fat replaced by fiber, elaborated with meat f...
Article
Full-text available
The effects of finishing diet (pasture or grain) and meat preservation method on beef’s physicochemical, micro- biological, and sensory attributes were evaluated. The preservation methods assessed were dry aging in bag (DAb) and wet aging (WA) for 40 d, and then frozen storage (Fr) ([DAb + Fr] and [WA + Fr]) for 180 d. Sixty striploins (Longissimus...
Article
Non-invasive technologies could help to guarantee quality standards of canned tuna fish. The aim of this study was to investigate the ability of bench-top (FT-NIR) and low-cost (LC-NIR) near infrared spectrometers to determine salt content and texture in canned tuna. Salt content distribution was also investigated using hyperspectral imaging (HSI)...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
INTRODUCCIÓN Los cerdos machos enteros son más eficientes que los castrados (Fàbrega et al., 2010; Pauly et al., 2009). Sin embargo, su carne puede presentar olor sexual, un defecto sensorial que perciben algunos consumidores disminuyendo su aceptabilidad (Font i Furnols et al., 2008). La inmunocastración es una alternativa a la castración quirúrgi...
Article
Pork belly is an important and heterogeneous cut, characterized by its fat content. Immunocastration is an alternative to surgical castration that can modify the composition of carcasses and cuts and it can affect at its processing. This work compares the morphological, mechanical and compositional characteristics of pork belly of (1) pure Duroc pi...
Article
Full-text available
Meat and meat products are important sources of protein in the human diet. However, their consumption or excessive consumption has been questioned as this has been related to sustainability and health issues. Due to this, alternatives to conventional meat consumption, such as meat produced more sustainably or meat alternatives, have been considered...
Chapter
This book article synthesizes the scientific literature that shows the differences in the way organic meat is produced, and why these differences are important for consumer health and safety, planetary health, and the impact of climate change. The changing global narrative on livestock agriculture and climate change illustrates how organic meat pro...
Article
Pork production has undergone a shift towards the rearing of entire male pigs, however, its meat might carry with the presence of boar taint and it would be considered "unfit for human consumption". To offer a new alternative to the pork sector tailored to the needs of consumers, a viable option would be the use of edible spiced gelatin films to he...
Article
Full-text available
The objective of the study was to evaluate the effects of three production systems on growth performance, behavior, blood parameters, carcass characteristics, and meat quality. A total of 30 lambs (n = 10 lambs/treatment) were randomly assigned to three production systems that included rotational grazing (NG) and two different levels of concentrate...
Article
This study compares minced carcass chemical composition and meat quality of castrated (CM), immunocastrated (IM) and entire male (EM), and female (FE) pigs at 70, 100 and 120 kg target body weights (TBW) (n = 80; 20 per sex). Sex affected fat, protein, and moisture content of the minced carcasses. Carcass fatty acid (FA) composition was affected by...
Article
This study aimed at understanding which molecules were responsible for the differences existing in boar taint sensory evaluation. The latter was therefore linked to the results of skatole and androstenone chemical analyses, fatty acid composition and VOC profiles of heated backfat. This study confirmed that some discrepancy exists between chemical...
Article
Full-text available
The aim of this study was to characterize three different commercial dairy beef fattening systems for intensive Mediterranean fattening programs differing in gender, breed, nutrition, and days of feed in order to describe their performance, behavior, and carcass and meat quality when they were raised simultaneously under the same housing and care c...
Article
Revered, desired, hated and even persecuted, meat leaves almost no one indifferent. It is a fundamental element of our culture and traditions, and gives rise to numerous controversies, trends and social movements. Currently, there are many dilemmas raised by its production and consumption, from ethical and moral to environmental, economic and healt...
Article
Full-text available
Animal performance, carcass and meat quality characteristics of beef cull cows under different feeding strategies were evaluated. Cows were allotted to one of four direct grazing treatments combining different levels of forage allowance (FA) and supplementation rate (% of live body weight, BW) using rice bran (RB): T1= FA2%+RB0, T2= FA4%+RB0, T3= F...
Article
This study compares performance, body and carcass composition among castrated (CM), immunocastrated (IM) and entire males (EM), and females (FE) at 30, 70, 100 and 120 kg of body weight (total of n = 92; 20–24/sex type). Overall, IM had similar growth and feed intake to CM and greater than EM and FE. At each slaughter stage, IM had a lower killing-...
Article
This paper analyses meat consumption and consumer attitudes towards meat and meat analogues in Spain, as well as the barriers and motives that could modify meat consumption in the future. Probably, the trend observed in the decline in meat consumption before the pandemic, which stabilized during the pandemic, will be observed again, with health, an...
Article
Full-text available
The practice of surgical castration of piglets and its alternatives is still under debate. Production of boars may impair meat quality due to boar taint and reduced tenderness compared to meat from surgically castrated male pigs, while immunocastration reduces boar taint and may improve meat quality but seems to be less accepted by the pig chain. I...
Article
Full-text available
Simple Summary Pig castration is a common practice in the Iberian breed (boar and gilts), known for the quality of its products. This work studies the effect of pig castration (surgically castrated females and males, immunocastrated females and males and entire females) on the sensory expectations and acceptability of the meat. Attitudes and belief...
Article
The inclusion of crude and acid oils from olive pomace can lead to more unsaturated meat products and, especially in the case of olive pomace acid oil, achieve a more economically and environmentally sustainable swine production. The objective of this trial was to study the effect of dietary supplementation with crude and acid oils from olive pomac...
Article
Purpose In the past two decades the popularity of artisan cheese emerged. The present study aimed to investigate similarities and differences in beliefs towards artisan cheeses among participants from Serbia, Croatia and Spain and to determine consumer profiles. Better understanding of their behaviours and beliefs could serve as the basis for the d...
Poster
Full-text available
Both consumers and industry are demanding low-cost tools to prevent fraudulent practices on animal feeding regime declarations. The aim of this study was to determine the ability of two low-cost NIR sensors intended for consumers to discriminate pork meat according to the animal’s feeding regime. Effect of the measurement’s location (inner and oute...
Article
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The aim of the present study was (1) to investigate what consumers include within the concept of food sustainability and its link with sustainable consumption, by identifying meaningful consumer typologies from the concept of food sustainability and food choice factors framed by SDG 12, and (2) to know how different farm systems attributes affectin...
Article
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Phosphorus (P) is an essential mineral for growing piglets, which is poorly accessible in vegetable feedstuffs as it is stored as phytates. Thus, phytase supplementation is essential to increase P availability. Two experiments were conducted to evaluate a novel 6-phytase (EC 3.1.3.26) in weaned pigs fed low-P diets. In each experiment, one hundred...
Article
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Because castrated male pigs convert feed into meat less efficiently than entire males, they are less efficient regarding the utilization of resources [...]
Article
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Castration is a common practice in Iberian pigs due to their advanced age and high weight at slaughter. Immunocastration (IC) is an alternative to surgical castration that influences carcass and cut fatness. These traits need to be evaluated in vivo and postmortem. The aims of the present work were (a) to determine the relationship between ham comp...
Article
Full-text available
At present, two types of fattening are carried out in Iberian traditional pig production. The montanera is the fattening system where fatteners are fed on acorns and pasture in the dehesa, and cebo de campo is the fattening where the pigs are fed on compound feed and natural resources, mainly pasture. The aim of this paper is to analyze Iberian fat...
Article
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Computed tomography (CT) is a non-destructive technique, based on X-rays, that has been used in several livestock species to evaluate carcass composition. The objective of this study was to construct predictive equations to estimate carcass and viscera composition for preweaning calves using CT. For this purpose, 24 Holstein male calves (4 ± 0.9 d...
Conference Paper
Imaging technologies such as computed tomography and ultrasound can be used in livestock. All heavy pigs need to be castrated and immunocastration is an alternative to surgical castration. The objectives of the present work were: (1) to determine the relationship between fat thickness (measured in vivo by ultrasounds and post mortem by a ruler) and...
Article
Palatability of meat is known to be affected by intramuscular fat (IMF), but the effect in relatively low-fat New Zealand lamb is unknown. This study evaluated the eating quality of 108 loins (M. longissimus lumborum) from a single flock of ewe-lambs. Loins ranged from 1.09–5.68% IMF and were stratified into 6 groups: 1.65, 2.12, 2.65, 3.20, 3.58 a...
Article
Full-text available
Classification of carcasses at the slaughter line allows an optimisation of its processing and differentiated payment to producers. Boar taint is a quality characteristic that is evaluated in some slaughter plants. This odour and flavour is mostly present in entire males and perceived generally by sensitive consumers as unpleasant. In the present w...
Article
Full-text available
Due to the strong public initiative in Europe and increased regulator focus to mitigate pain, surgical castration of pigs is being gradually abandoned, while the importance of other sex categories like entire males (EM) and immunocastrates (IC) increases. Although beneficial for animal welfare and economics, their use also brings forward several qu...
Article
Full-text available
Surgical castration of piglets without pain relief is still common practice in many countries. Possible alternatives for surgical castration are application of pain relief or anaesthesia or production of boars (entire males) and immunocastrates. Each of these alternatives faces advantages and disadvantages which may result in different citizen atti...
Article
The Spanish market offers a greater variety of Iberian pork products. The aim of this paper is to determine the perception of consumers of several aspects of Iberian pig production and animal welfare depending on the consumers' characteristics. Consumers from two Spanish regions (n=403) answered a questionnaire about their beliefs and the importanc...
Article
The pig is a valuable animal model to study obesity in humans due to the physiological similarity between humans and pigs in terms of digestive and associated metabolic processes. The dietary use of vegetal protein, probiotics and omega-3 fatty acids is recommended to control weight gain and to fight obesity-associated metabolic disorders. Likewise...
Article
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The aim of this exploratory work, because of the existing bias on the size of the sample and some of the sociodemographic characteristics of the participants, was to investigate the Eastern European consumers’ beliefs and attitudes toward animal welfare, to perform a cross-country segmentation analysis and to observe possible differences with their...
Article
Restricted feed can affect the body composition of pigs. Body composition can be studied non-destructively in live pigs using computed tomography (CT). The objective was to investigate the effect of different feeding restriction strategies on the productive and carcass quality parameters of gilts during growth via CT images and the effects of such...
Article
As obesity incidence is alarmingly rising among young individuals, we aimed to characterize an experimental model of this situation, considering the similarity between human and porcine physiology. For this reason, we fed prepubertal (63 days-old) Duroc breed females (n=20) either with a standard growth diet (3800 KCal/day) or one with a high-calor...
Article
Castration of male piglets is a common practice to avoid boar taint but is being questioned. The present work has an exploratory character and aims to investigate the beliefs and attitudes of Eastern European consumers regarding boar taint, surgical castration immunocastration and perception of meat from castrated pigs and to find out possible segm...
Article
Full-text available
The aim of this study is to provide an overview of consumer attitudes and beliefs regarding pig welfare and quality of pork meat. Regarding animal welfare, several aspects of farm management and practice were considered, with an emphasis on alternatives to surgical castration without pain control, such as entire male production, castration with ana...
Article
Osteochondrosis (OC) is a multifactorial defective endochondral ossification that causes lameness and early culling in gilts and sows. Previous research suggested that nutrition and growth rate could influence OC development and progression. As part of a broader study [n = 360 gilts; 28.8 ± 8.8 kg body weight (BW)] designed to evaluate the effect o...
Article
Full-text available
Abandoning of male piglets castration in the European Union is a challenge for the pork production sector in particular for high-quality dry-cured traditional products. The information on consumer acceptability of dry-cured products from alternatives is limited, so the objective was to test the consumer acceptability of unsmoked traditional dry-cur...
Article
The thickness of the subcutaneous fat (SFT)is a very important parameter in the ham, since determines the process the ham will be submitted. This study compares two methods to predict the SFT in slaughter line: an automatic system using an SVM model (Support Vector Machine)and a manual measurement of the fat carried out by an experienced operator,...
Article
We studied the anatomy and cytology of the midgut gland (MGl) of the common spider crab Maja brachydactyla Balss, 1922 at several life stages (zoea, megalopa, first juvenile, and adult) using dissection, histology, electron microscopy, computed tomography, and micro-computed tomography (micro-CT). In newly hatched larvae, 14 blind-end tubules form...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
The quality of pig carcasses, meat and pork products is reflected by different dimensions: economic (commercial value), technological (processing ability), sensory (appearance, texture, flavour, etc.) and nutritional (nutrient supply meeting human nutritional requirements). Each of these dimensions is described by several indicators, evaluated by d...
Book
The quality of pig carcasses, meat and pork products is reflected by different dimensions: economic (commercial value), technological (processing ability), sensory (appearance, texture, flavour, etc.) and nutritional (nutrient supply meeting human nutritional requirements). Each of these dimensions is described by several indicators, evaluated by d...
Poster
Full-text available
The aim of the present work was to evaluate the effect of both fattening managements on animal welfare at the farm and the slaughterhouse.
Article
The beef industry and meat supply chain face several challenges worldwide. These challenges imply increasing overall productivity in order to satisfy a growing population, while keeping a business profitability and product quality and yet minimising its environmental impact. The objective of this paper was to address consumers´preferences consumers...
Article
Full-text available
Intramuscular fat (IMF) content depends on sex, genotype and diet and varies with pig growth. The aim of the present work was to determine the evolution of IMF by genotype-sex, muscle and muscle location, to determine relationships between IMF content of different muscles and to predict IMF in live pigs with computed tomography (CT). For this purpo...
Article
The quality of a pig carcass is mainly measured by the lean meat percentage (LMP), which can be virtually estimated from computed tomography (CT) scans. Different strategies exist to classify the CT voxels into tissues such as fat, lean and bone, being the thresholding-based methods the most commonly used. However, these methods are usually affecte...
Article
Full-text available
Simple Summary Interest in animal welfare has increased and been considered a relevant attribute for the concept of the ethical quality of pig products. The present study suggests that consumers would appreciate particular improvements on animal welfare such as providing environmental enrichment or herbal compounds. The provision of those welfare i...
Article
Full-text available
Today most of the scientific research is aimed at revealing the biological basis underlying the economic traits in pigs which often results in shortcomings due to biological trade-off naturally occurring in all domestic animals. Local (indigenous) pig breeds have not been submitted to selective breeding for productivity and the revived interest for...
Article
The thickness of the subcutaneous fat in hams is one of the most important factors for the dry-curing process and largely determines its final quality. This parameter is usually measured in slaughterhouses by a manual metrical measure to classify hams. The aim of the present study was to propose an automatic classification method based on data obta...
Presentation
IMMUNOCASTRATION is an alternative to surgical castration. Because of the long life cycle of Iberian pigs, the standard immunocastration protocol was modified to 3-dose of vaccine The aim of the present work was to evaluate the influence of two immunocastration protocols: pre-pubertal (early) and prefinishing (late) on the composition of hams from...
Poster
Full-text available
One alternative to surgical castration of pigs is the immunocastration. Due to the Iberian pig long life cycle (approximately 16 months), the standard immunocastration protocol had to be modified.
Article
Full-text available
The perspective of a possible ban on surgical castration of male pigs in the EU is a real challenge for pork production systems aiming at (very) high-quality products. Information was collected from a total of 272 situations in 16 European countries, including 170 situations related to EU protected designations (Database of Origin & Registration (D...
Article
A consumer study was performed in four EU countries to further clarify the acceptability of meat with boar taint. In Denmark, France, Italy and Poland, a total of 476 female consumers evaluated 8 meat patties from boars with varying levels of skatole (0.10-0.40μg/g fat tissue) and androstenone (0.47-2.00 μg/g fat tissue), in a pair-wise comparison...
Technical Report
Full-text available
Resumen: Los consumidores europeos reclaman productos más naturales y con un mayor grado de bienestar animal, siendo la oferta actual de este tipo de productos escasa. La demanda de este tipo de alimentos, puede llegar a ser una oportunidad para el mundo del Ibérico. Por ello, el objetivo de este trabajo fue estudiar las opiniones de los consumidor...
Article
Full-text available
Various European Union pork chain actors and stakeholders agreed in 2010 on a road map to voluntarily abandon piglet castration by 1 January 2018. Because currently in Serbia, male piglets are surgically castrated and consumers are not used to the boar taint odour and flavour, the introduction of boar meat may modify the acceptability of pork. The...
Book
The overall objective of the COST action IPEMA is to find and disseminate general, region-specific or chain-specific solutions for the development of alternatives to surgical castration of male pigs: entire male production (EM) and immunocastration (IC). IPEMA is looking for integrated solutions taking into account meat quality (boar taint, water h...
Article
Full-text available
Emerging non-destructive technologies are of interest in meat sector science and industry since they allow the characterization of products and quality control throughout processing. Th ree diff erent new technologies described in this paper will be considered in the TREASURE project for the evaluation and prediction of quality of pork and processe...
Article
Full-text available
Growth of total fat and lean and of primal cuts is affected by the sex type – CORRIGENDUM - A. Carabús, R. D. Sainz, J. W. Oltjen, M. Gispert, M. Font-i-Furnols
Poster
Full-text available
Iberian crossbreds fattened under intensive management systems need to be fed diets that reduce the growth rate to reach a minimum carcass weight of 115 kg in minimum 10 months. Potential options that might help to achieve productivity objectives with more sustainable diets are the use of low protein diets and sub-products (i.e. “alperujo” from the...