Determination of Protein Quality of Oven Dried Clam (Mecerneria m.), Whelk (Thias c.), Oyster (Crossostrea g.) and Periwinkle (Tympanotonus f.) Meat Using Rat Bioassay

Meat samples of four species of shell fish; Clam (Mercenaria mercenaria), Whelk (Thias coronate), Oyster (Crassostrea gasar) and Periwinkle (Tympanotonus fuscatus) were processed using oven drying and their nutritional content determined by proximate analysis. The protein content was then subjected to quality analysis using rat’s bioassay to determine PER and in vivo APD values. Nutritionally the four shell fish meat samples considered in this study shows that whelk contains the highest levels of moisture with 13.96±0.01, Oyster 8.99±0.00, clam 8.98±0.01 and least is periwinkle with moisture content of 6.50±0.14. The fat content of the shell fish meat samples considered shows that oyster contains the highest fat content of 10.60±0.00, cam 10.07±0.03, whelk 9.20±0.00 and the least is periwinkle with 4.76±0.01. The ash content was highest in whelk with 5.62±0.00, clam 5.07±0.03, oyster 4.23±0.00 and the least is periwinkle with 3.38±0.01. The fibre content was highest in whelk with 10.45±0.01, clam 10.10±0.00, oyster5.33±0.04 and the least is periwinkle with 3.56±0.01. Periwinkle has the highest protein content of 70.42±0.03, oyster 64.70±0.00, whelk 47.30±0.03 and the least is clam with 46.90±0.00. Protein Efficiency Ratio (PER) and in vivo Apparent Protein Digestibility (APD) were used to determine the protein quality in the meat samples using casein as the reference protein. The PER results indicates that clam, whelk, oyster, periwinkle and casein have PER values of 1.76±0.02, 1.34±0.01, 1.83±0.00, 1.46±0.00, and 2.28±0.01 respectively. The PER values however significantly differ from each other at (P<0.05). The percentage in vivo APD values of 79±0.71, 81±0.63, 86±0.71, 90±0.00 for clam, whelk, oyster, periwinkle and casein respectively were obtained. Results indicates that meat samples considered in the study contains high quality proteins that can support lively wood like other conventional protein sources such as cow meat, fish, egg and milk.