We report a case of diffuse melanosis secondary to metastatic malignant melanoma in a Nelore bull. Clinical signs included isolation from the herd, epistaxis, hyperthermia, pale ocular membranes, mucoid diarrhea and dark urine. Despite anti-inflammatory and antibiotic therapy, the bull died 45 days after the onset of the clinical signs. The most striking lesion was diffuse black discoloration to the visceral organs including liver, spleen, lungs, lymph nodes, and kidneys; all these affect organs were moderately enlarged”. The urine was black. Histologically, 50-80% of the parenchyma of the liver, spleen and lymph nodes was obliterated by aggregates of melanin-loaded neoplastic melanocytes. Those neoplastic cells also occurred within capillaries of the liver, spleen, lymph nodes, urinary bladder, lungs and kidneys. Immunohistochemistry of neoplastic melanocytes was positive for Melan A and PNL2 markers. Abundant brown to black pigment was found in melanophages in the lungs, confirmed by IBA1 immunohistochemistry.

The objective was to evaluate the main factors that influence the shear strength of meat from confined steers and the probability of obtaining soft meat. For this purpose, we evaluated the literature on carcass and/or meat of beef steers in Brazil published between January 1999 and April 2019 and extracted the content from three sections for analysis: materials and methods, results, and discussion. Pearson’s correlation was used to analyze the data, and the stepwise statistic was used to determine the proportion of the synchronized effect of variables on shear force. For determining the probability of tenderness, meat with a shear force lower than 4.6 kgf/cm3 was classified as soft; meat with a higher sheer force was classified as hard. Following the classification, logistic regression analysis and odds ratio test were performed. The factors of study location, the proportion of zebu background in the genome, finishing weight, the percentage of concentrate in the diet, and finishing period and meat marbling explained 62.45% of the variability in the shear strength of beef. The following strategies were found to increase the chances of effectively obtaining soft meat from confined steers: starting the termination phase early even in animals with lower weights, prolonging the confinement time, increasing concentrate percentage in the diet, and a higher marbling degree. It is possible to estimate a large proportion of shear force variability using the production variables (ante-mortem), and the process can be adjusted accordingly to considerable increase the possibility of obtaining soft meat.