1. Muscle shortening, sarcomere lengths and pH values were measured in strips of chicken M. pectoralis major (PM) muscle incubated at different time (0 to 24 h) and temperature (0° to 40°C) combinations immediately after slaughter; their effects on cooking loss and meat tenderness determined. 2. Maximum muscle shortening of 39% and 43% occurred at 0°C and 40°C respectively. At 0°C, most shortening occurred within 90 min postmortem when the pH of the muscle ranged from 7.13 to 6.52. In contrast, at 40°C, most shortening occurred during the development of rigor mortis, between 90 and 380 min post-mortem, when the muscle pH ranged from 6.16 to 5.89. In a similar manner, minimum sarcomere lengths of 1.38 μm were reached after 90 min at 0°C while more severe sarcomere shortening, to 0.96 μm and 0.86 μm at 30°C and 40°C respectively, was not complete until after 380 min post-mortem. Between 5°C and 20°C, muscle shortening ranged from 25 to 34% while minimum sarcomere lengths of 1.33 μm were recorded. 3. Cooking losses increased on average from 7 to 16% between 30 and 380 min post-mortem, with maximum losses of 19% being achieved by the end of the 24-h incubation period. 4. At 0°C, shear force values increased from 2.94 kg/cm 2 to 4.34 kg/cm 2 between 30 and 90 min post-mortem while the muscle pH was > 6.5. At all other temperatures, increases in shear force values were not detected until 380 min post-mortem when the muscle pH had fallen to 5.9 and rigor mortis had set in. At all times after 380 min, however, the muscle strips incubated at 0, 5 and 40°C had lower shear values (range 3.17 to 5.49 kg/cm 2 ) than those incubated from 10°C to 30°C (range 5.06 to 7.22 kg/cm 2 ). 5. A significant quadratic relationship was found between the degree of shortening and subsequent cooked meat tenderness, in which peak toughness occurred at 30% shortening. This would suggest that the actual extent 5 Reprint requests to Dr Gault. 689 Downloaded by [McGill University Library] at 15:35 08 February 2015 690 A. A. DUNN ETAL.of muscle shortening per se has an important role to play in determining the tenderness of chicken post-mortem. Consequently, with unrestrained chicken muscle, where extensive shortening occurred at 0°C and 40°C (i.e cold-and rigor shortening) the cooked meat was more tender than that subjected to intermediate post-mortem temperature regimens.