Detection of mislabelled seafood products in Malaysia by DNA barcoding: Improving transparency in food market

Seafood mislabelling is a global issue following the increasing worldwide seafood trade particularly of processed seafood products, as well as a general lack of regulations and tight enforcement in some countries. This study is a pioneering seafood forensics survey conducted in Malaysia. A total of 62 seafood samples, either raw, frozen or variously processed, were collected from commercial sources. Molecular analyses were performed by sequencing Full DNA Barcoding (FDB) with target region of 700 bp or Mini Barcoding (MDB) with smaller target region of only similar to 150 bp. The DNA barcode sequences obtained were compared with those available on BOLD and GenBank databases. The DNA targets were successfully amplified and sequenced from 81% of seafood samples. Among these samples, 16% were found to have been mislabelled at source. This study supports the view that DNA barcoding can be a powerful tool in seafood forensics. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.