Effect of pressure cooking alone and in combination with other treatments on shrimp allergic protein, tropomyosin

Abstract

Shrimp allergen, tropomyosin is a highly heat stable allergen a common causative of shrimp allergy in sensitive individuals. Effect of house hold pressure cooking on immunogenicity of shrimp allergen, topomyosin from Metapenaeus dobsoni was investigated in both shrimp extract and peeled shrimp by extending the time of pressure cooking to 5, 10 and 20 min. Soaked shrimps in salt, baking soda, papain and acetic acid along with pressure cooking was also investigated. In the case of extracts, IgE activity was significantly (p < 0.05) decreased and the tropomyosin band was absent in the immunoblott using pooled sera of shrimp sensitive individuals. While in the case of whole peeled shrimp, IgE activity was significantly (p < 0.05) increased and the tropomyosin band was retained in the immunoblott analysis which indicates the retention of allerginicity in the peeled shrimp. Although pressure cooked shrimp after soaking in acetic acid didn’t show significant (p > 0.05) difference to that of without soaking, the tropomyosin band was observed to be very faint or absent in SDS PAGE and immunoblott analysis which indicated the effective reduction in allegenicity of whole peeled shrimp.