# Meat 4.0: Principles and Applications of Industry 4.0 Technologies in the Meat Industry
## 4 Industry 4.0 Technologies Applied for Meat Quality, Safety, and Authenticity
### Application of Industry 4.0 Technologies for Meat Safety  
Food safety is one of the key areas of the food market and today it is being challenged by the global dimensions of supply chains [103]. At the same time, there is a growing concern about the health aspects of meat and its derivatives by consumers, who often have limited confidence in the safety of certain meat products [104]. For these reasons, the application of new IR 4.0 tools to control and guarantee the meat safety is fundamental in the development of the food industry, thus averting foodborne illness and outbreaks because of microbiological deterioration and contaminations [55]. Table 3 shows some of the applications of IR 4.0 technologies in the meat industry (or their potential use in this sector) aimed at improving food safety. From the start of animal slaughter to obtaining the portion of meat or the final meat product that reaches the consumer, a multitude of tasks are carried out (skinning, plucking, eviscerating, boning, cutting, mixing, resting, stuffing, etc.). These operations expose the meat to environmental contamination and to contamination related to human handling since traditionally all processes were conducted by humans. In this field, robotization and automation allow meat and meat products to be obtained with less human contact, which greatly favours the reduction of the microbial load [59]. In addition, robotization and automation favour a higher processing speed [60], thus reducing the chances of contamination. In this way, microbiological risks are reduced with the implementation of robots and automation systems, increasing the safety of meat and meat products [29]. Although to a lesser extent than for meat quality estimation, hyperspectral imaging technology is also a potential tool in safety prediction as it can be used to determine contaminations and detect microbial growth [55]. Specifically, this methodology has been widely studied in poultry meat since it is an IR 4.0 tool that permits the elimination of faecal material contaminated carcasses [105], thus preventing the proliferation of bacteria such as _Salmonella_, _Campylobacter_, and _Escherichia coli_. Furthermore, in poultry products, microbial contaminations related to foodborne illnesses (such as _Enterobacteriaceae_, _Salmonella_, _Campylobacter_, _Escherichia coli_, and _Pseudomonas_) can be predicted with the use of hyperspectral imaging [106; 107; 108; 109; 110]. In the case of other meat matrices, hyperspectral images have also been employed in order to predict microbial contamination in real time. For example, [PERSON] et al. [112] developed a prediction model (based on PLSR) to determine the total viable count (TVC) in beef, while [PERSON] et al. [113] proposed a model for _Pseudomonas fluorescens_ prediction in pork (based on [PERSON] model in combination with the Ratkowsky square-root model and the Huang model in combination with the Ratkowsky square-root model). In the case of TVC prediction, this is done mainly using wavelengths around 596 nm, which are related to the oxyhaemoglobin absorption bands [114], meanwhile the differentiation of bacterial species is based on the different absorption spectra shown between them [115]. In the field of food safety, the topic of allergies also acquires special interest since around 8% of children and 5% of adults around the world have some type of clinically proven food allergy [116]. Considering the circumstances, the use of IR 4.0 technologies can favour the exhaustive control of a product in industries and/or provide valuable information that allows allergic people to be warned. In this field, there are different IR 4.0 technologies that permit allergens to be revealed, such as those created by Tellspec Inc. (Toronto, ON, Canada), and Nima Lab (San Francisco, CA, USA) in 2014 and 2016, respectively.