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Cannonball jellyfish (Stomolophus meleagris) from the Gulf of Mexico has been under investigation as a potential source to meet the market demand for jellyfish food in Asia. Traditionally, jellyfish are processed by curing fresh jellyfish with salt and alum, and then the cured jellyfish are desalted in water before consumption. Very little is known about the inorganic constituents of jellyfish. In this study fresh and desalted processed cannonball jellyfish were examined for 22 elements using inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry. The desalted processed tissues had significantly higher Al concentrations (leg, 688 μg/g; umbrella, 271 μg/g) than fresh jellyfish (leg, 0.29 μg/g; umbrella,1.63 μg/g). Concentrations of macro elements, such as Ca, Mg, K, and Na, were high in fresh jellyfish and rather low in desalted processed tissue. The results should be useful in providing biological and nutritional information about fresh and processed jellyfish. Keywords: Jellyfish; ICP; mineral elements

Jellyfish have been exploited commercially by Chinese as an important food for more than a thousand years. Semidried jellyfish represent a multi-million dollar seafood business in Asia. Traditional processing methods involve a multi-phase processing procedure using a mixture of salt (NaC1) and alum (A1K[SO4]2 · 12 H2O) to reduce the water content, decrease the pH, and firm the texture. Processed jellyfish have a special crunchy and crispy texture. They are then desalted in water before preparing for consumption. Interest in utilizing Stomolophus meleagris L. Agassiz, cannonball jellyfish, from the U. S. as food has increased recently because of high consumer demand in Asia. Desalted ready-to-use (RTU) cannonball jellyfish consists of approximately 95% water and 4–5% protein, which provides a very low caloric value. Cannonball jellyfish collagen has shown a suppressing effect on antigeninduced arthritis in laboratory rats. With the great abundance of cannonball jellyfish in the U. S. coastal waters, turning this jellyfish into value-added products could have tremendous environmental and economicbenefits.