The study was conducted to investigate the differences in the compounds responsible for volatile flavors in Hanwoo and imported fresh beef from Australia, United States and New Zealand. Different imported beef samples were prepared as Angus beef from Australia, United States and New Zealand and the cross beef from the United States. Significant differences (p<0.05) in hexanal, benzaldehyde, octanal, nonanal, nonenal, decanal, E-2-decenal, hexadecyloxirane, tetradecanal, 2,2-dideutero octadecanal, octadecanal, pentadecane, 2,5-dimethyl pyrazine, 4-methyl-2-propyl-furan, 2-hexylfuran, 2-butylfuran, 2- pentylfuran, 2-heptyl furan were observed between loin and eye of round from Hanwoo and imported beef (p<0.05). In loin muscles, various volatile compounds such as hexanal, heptanal, octanal, E-2-octenal, nonenal, E-2-decenal, E,E,2,4-decadienal, 2-undecenal, heptane, 2-butyl furan were found to be significantly higher in Hanwoo beef as compared to imported beef. However, in the round muscles of Hawnoo eye compounds that were observed to be significantly higher were pentanal, hexanal, heptanal, benzaldehyde, octanal, nonanal, E-2 -decenal, octadecanal, 2-furan methanol and 2-pentyl furan. Further study need to be determined if those volatile compounds can be used as a bio-marker to identify origins of beef.

Recently there has been an increasing amount of foreign livestock products distributed in the domestic market due to the market opening. Some vicious dealers sell the foreign beef in the trade name of the native beef during the final distribution step to arouse the social criticism frequently. In this report, we investigated a method to distinguish the native beef from the foreign one scientifically using the PCR-RAPD, a recent gene technique. Hygienical safety was also examined using a microbiological test for toxicity of Escherichia coli O157:H7 and the food poisoning bacteria. The conditions of DNA amplification for the PCR analysis were 1 × Taq polymerise buffer, 1.5 mM MgCl₂, 50 uM dNTP, 100 ng primers, 2.5 unit Taq polymerise and 5-20 ng template DNA, with the final volume of 50 Etl. The size of the amplified product was detected mostly in the range of 0.5-2.0 kbp. The size of DNA, gene marking factor, which could be a criterion distinguishing the native beef from the foreign one, appeared approximately 1.2 kbp. The native beef was distinguished from the foreign beef with more than 90% of confidence by the gene marking factor. This method was expected to be useful in the breed discrimination between the native beef and the foreign one. The hygienical test results showed that, fortunately, neither Salmonella spp. and Listeria monocytogenes which form a principal cause of the food poisoning nor Enterohemorrhagic Escherichia coli : EHEC which have provoked a recent social disturbance, were detected at all.