Amino Acids in Muscles of Maccullochella peelii

To provide information for theaquaculture and marketing purposes,the amino acid contents of Maccullochella peelii during its growth periods and at time of harvest for a comparison with groupers and sturgeonswere determined using an automatic amino acid analyzer.The results showed that the maximumtotal amino acid content of 70.96%(on dry-basis)was reached when the fish was considered marketable.They were lower for thejuveniles at 69.24% and the parent fish at 65.36%.The ratiosbetween different kinds of amino acidson the parent and marketable fish were similar,but EAA/TAA for the juveniles was approximately 2% lower,while EAA/NEAA2% higher than the others.Insofar as thepalatability as food is concerned,the meats from thethreespecies all contained more than 50% TAA(i.e,M.peeliiat 57.17%,grouper at 57.68%,and sturgeon at57.85%).In addition,the E/T of M.peelii was 40.34,and E/NT 67.62,which are higher than thereference standardsset for the protein by WHO/FAO(i.e.,40%for E/Tand greater than 60%for E/NT).