Is Something Fishy About Your Sushi?

Last Updated (Thursday, 04 September 2008 10:42) Written by Raymond Nakamura

"Would you like real crab in your California roll?"
asks the woman taking my order. Of course, I say yes, even though I probably can't tell the difference between that and the imitation crab, which is usually pollock. At least she's up front about it. Unlike some people.

This article describes two high school grads in New York  who took samples of raw fish samples from sushi restaurants and sent them off to a lab or identification. They found out that a number of samples were not what they were supposed to be.

My thesis supervisor once told me about the advantages of studying something you can eat. He had studied lobster. I failed to heed his advice when I chose to study sand dollars. Although they are related to uni, which is sea urchin in sushi talk, sand dollars are not good eating (too much grit).

Anyway, I was astounded that these two would show such initiative, especially given that they didn't do it for marks or even as a science fair project. But it wasn't quite as simple as that. Turns out that the Dad of one of them is a big advocate for a technique called DNA bar coding.

DNA bar coding uses a relatively short stretch of DNA in the mitochondria, which has its own DNA separate from the main DNA in the nucleus of a cell. This makes it easier to analyse than many other methods. Scientists have found a section that hits the sweet spot of showing little variation between individuals of species and substantial differences between species. Advocates are pushing for using this method to catalogue as many critters as they can get their hands on to use a reference database.

A friend of mine who is a molecular biologist told me that some scientists used this technique about ten years ago to identify some mystery meat at markets in Japan, which turned out to be endangered species of whale.

The Dad in this story knew people who were already doing a big study on the identification of fish. They were based at the University of Guelph in Ontario where this technique was first developed. I am still impressed that the young women helped out to do this work. But don't try to copy them just yet. One of the leads in the global fish study told me they don't have the funding to test your leftover bento special.

So, have I dampened your appetite or whet it?

 Get the RSS Feed for SWOG