49 Asian Fisheries Science 13(2000): 49-55 Asian Fisheries Society, Manila, Philippines 49 Changes in the Functional Properties of Dressed Thread Fin Bream (Nemipterus japonicus) Proteins During Frozen Storage J. SARMA 1 , G. VIDYA SAGAR REDDY 2* and L.N. SRIKAR 3 1 College of Fishery Science Assam Agricultural University Raha, Assam India 2 Department of Fish Processing Technology Fisheries Research Station Acharya N.G. Ranga Agricultural University Kakinada 533 007, Andhra Pradesh, India 3 Dept. of Biochemistry, College of Fisheries University of Agricultural Sciences Mangalore-575 002 India Abstract Frozen storage of thread fin bream for 12 weeks at -18 ºC resulted in a significant (P < 0.05) decrease in salt soluble proteins (SSP), protein solubility (PS), emulsifying capacity (EC), water binding potential (WBP) and relative viscosity (RV) of the SSP extracts. Functional prop- erties correlated significantly (P < 0.05) with SSP and PS suggesting that myofibrillar proteins are the main proteins that determine these properties. Significant correlations (P < 0.05) also existed among EC, RV and WBP. Marked variations in the functional properties investigated suggest that these functional properties may be considered as valuable indicators in determin- ing the quality of fish proteins. Introduction Freezing and frozen storage are important methods of preserving fish and fishery products. Although undesirable changes such as microbial growth and other biochemical changes are largely controlled by frozen stor- age, changes in the functional properties do occur (Sikorski et al. 1976; Shenouda 1980). There are many reports on the biochemical changes in the *Corresponding author