Abstract: Freshness is not only an important factor affecting fresh meat quality classification, but also directly determines the shelf life of products. Therefore, it is important to construct a fresh meat freshness characterization system. However, the traditional methods are complicated to operate and time-consuming, so that they cannot give results rapidly and therefore cannot meet the current needs. Therefore, a fast and accurate technology for fresh meat freshness characterization is always urgently needed for the meat industry and is a research hotspot in academia. This paper summarizes the new technologies available for the determination of the freshness of fresh meat, including sensory bionics, intelligent response and spectrum analysis. It emphasizes on reviewing the advantages and disadvantages of these technologies and discusses future breakthrough directions. Lastly, this review is wrapped up with an outlook on future trends in this field, in order to provide a reference for further research.

Key words: fresh meat; freshness; sensory bionics; intelligent response; spectral analysis