Effect of extrusion processing on the soluble and insoluble fiber,and phytic acid contents of cereal brans

The health benefits associated with dietary fiber have resulted in it now being used in virtually all food product categories, including many products which are manufactured using extrusion processing. The objective of the present study was to determine if extrusion processing affected phytic acid, and soluble and insoluble fiber contents. The effect of screw speeds of 50, 70, and 100% of maximum rotations per minute (% MRPM) on these components was investigated. A BI-EX Model DNDG-62/20D co-rotating intermeshing self-cleaning twin-screw extruder, manufactured by Bühlerag, CH-9240, Uzwil, Switzerland, was used to process wheat, oat and rice brans. It was found that extrusion did not affect the insoluble fiber content of wheat bran; however, a decrease in this component was observed in rice and oat brans. The effect on rice bran insoluble fiber was greatest at screw speeds of 50 and 70% MRPM. This occurred in oat bran at 50% MRPM. Soluble fiber content increased in all brans after extrusion, except ER₁₀₀. For oat and rice bran soluble fibers, the greatest increase occurred at 50 and 70% MRPM, while for wheat bran this occurred at 70 and 100% MRPM. Extrusion did not affect the phytate content of the cereal brans.     

Effect of baking on free and bound phenolic acids in wholegrain bakery products

Phenolic compounds, particularly ferulic acid the most abundant phenolic in wheat, are the major contributors to the in vitro antioxidant capacity. They are present in wheat in free and bound forms which affect their bioavailability. Thus the current study aims to investigate changes in free and bound phenolic acids occurred during baking in wholegrain bread, cookie and muffin. The products were also fortified with lutein due to its proved health benefits, and were previously evaluated with regard to lutein stability and bioavailability and antioxidant properties. The control and fortified wholegrain bakery products contained reasonable amounts of free and bound phenolic acids with bread products exhibiting the highest level per serving (0.6 and 11.7 mg, respectively). Ferulic acid was the principal phenolic both in the free or bound extracts of the three products followed by p-coumaric acid in the bound extracts. Baking resulted in an increase in free phenolic acids in the three products, while bound phenolic acids decreased in bread and slightly changed in cookie and muffin products. Though the effect of baking appeared to be dependent on type of baked product, type of phenolic, recipe and baking conditions, the wholegrain products should be considered good sources of phenolic antioxidants.     

Relative amounts of tissues in mature wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) grain and their carbohydrate and phenolic acid composition

Hand dissection of mature grains from two common wheats (Triticum aestivum L., cv. Caphorn and cv. Crousty) were performed to quantitatively assess their tissue composition and to obtain homogeneous samples of embryonic axis, scutellum, starchy endosperm, aleurone layer, hyaline layer, outer pericarp and a composite layer made up of testa+hyaline layer+inner pericarp. Polymeric neutral sugar and phenolic acid contents of the samples were determined and used to identify specific composition patterns in each tissue irrespective of the cultivar. The scutellum and embryonic axis showed the lowest amount of carbohydrates with similar relative amounts of arabinose and xylose (Ara+Xyl), but the scutellum differed from the embryonic axis in its high phenolic acid, in particular ferulate dehydrodimer, content. The peripheral layers of the grains were mainly composed of cell wall polysaccharides, chiefly arabinoxylans but with differing structures. The hyaline layer was mostly composed of arabinoxylan with extremely low Ara/Xyl ratio (0.1), with high amounts of ferulic acid monomers and hence very weakly crosslinked. The aleurone layer differed from the outer pericarp by its much lower Ara/Xyl ratio and lower amounts of ferulic acid dimers and trimers. High proportions of ether-linked phenolic acids (released by alkali at 170 °C) were detected specifically in the seed coat and tissues in the crease region. The possible application of biochemical markers found in the various tissues to monitor wheat grain fractionation processes is discussed.     

An improved method for rapid quantitative analysis of the insoluble dietary fiber in common cereals and some sorts of beans

An improved rapid analysis for determining the content of insoluble dietary fiber (IDF) in common cereals and some sorts of beans is described in this paper. The procedure includes starch gelatinization in water bath for 20 min at 100 °C and 2.5% (w/w) α-amylase hydrolyzed reaction followed by neutral detergent wash and acetone extraction. Compared with 1.5 h for filtration (estimated) and 18 h for the enzymatic hydrolysis required by the typical American Association of Cereal Chemists (AACC) method, the filtration and enzymatic treatment procedures in the improved method was completed within 15 min and 1.5 h, respectively. The length of time for the filtration and the enzymatic hydrolysis for the improved method was significantly shortened from 19.5 h (AACC method) to 1.75 h. In addition, orthogonal array design (OAD) has been applied to optimize parameters of the improved method. The recovery yield of microcrystalline cellulose was 97.75% (w/w), in agreement with the result obtained using the typical AACC method, demonstrating the reliability of the improved method. Furthermore, several common cereals and beans were employed to validate the accuracy and universality of this improved method.     

Characterizing the pigmented traditional rice cultivars grown in temperate regions of Kashmir (India) for free and bound phenolics compounds and in vitro antioxidant properties

The purpose of the research was to identify the phenolic and flavonoid compounds of seven different traditional pigmented whole rice cultivars grown in the temperate regions of Kashmir so as to study their relationship with in vitro antioxidant capacities. The completely pigmented rice cultivars were found to have higher phenolic, flavonoid, anthocyanin contents and exhibited higher antioxidant capacities than the light colored and sparely colored rice cultivars. A total of 40 compounds had been identified in the analyzed rice cultivars that were found to be distributed in 6 major categories with 6-phenolics, 6-flavonoids, 11-hydroxycinnamic acid derivatives, 7-hydroxybenzoic acid derivatives, 3-anthocyanins and 7-flavonoid glucosides of different flavonoid compounds. Among the free and bound fractions for each cultivars the light and sparsely colored depicted higher content of phenolics and in vitro antioxidant properties in bound faction, while the completely pigmented cultivars showed higher antioxidant properties in free fractions. The anthocyanins quercetin-3-O-galactoside, cyanidin-3-O-rutinoside and pelargonidin-3-O-diglucoside had been identified by LC-MS existing in the free fractions of the analyzed rice cultivars whereas, the free fraction of acetone + H₂O possessed higher percentage of phenolic compounds as compared to methanolic extracts and bound fractions. The black colored cultivars possessed higher DPPH scavenging activity and lipid peroxidation inhibition.     

Real-time quantitative PCR based method for the quantification of fungal biomass to discriminate quantitative resistance in barley and wheat genotypes to fusarium head blight

Fusarium head blight (FHB) caused by Fusarium graminearum is one of the devastating diseases of small grain crops, including barley and wheat. Breeding for resistance is one of the best and ecofriendly strategies to manage the FHB. However, the existing methods used for screening genotypes, both under field and greenhouse conditions, often resulted in high experimental error, leading to inconsistent ranking of genotypes over years. In the postgenomic era, precise assessment of resistance is crucial to identify candidate genes. Here, we report a pathogen inoculation procedure and a real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) based protocol for the quantification and discrimination of quantitative resistance among barley and wheat genotypes to FHB. Using Fusarium specific primer pair Tri6_10, for the trichothecene biosynthetic cluster (Tri6) gene, we successfully quantified the relative fungal biomass in both spikelets and rachis. A qPCR of spikelets and rachis collected on 6 dpi, from inoculated three alternate spikelet regions, discriminated resistance with less experimental error than those based on the proportion of spikelets diseased (PSD) at 9 dpi. This method can be applied for medium to high-throughput barley and wheat breeding programmes to discriminate quantitative resistance among genotypes against FHB.