Comparison of Allergy-Inducible Wheat Protein Contents among Imported and Domestic Wheat Flours in Korea

Abstract

Wheat is a staple food in the Korean diet, which is increasingly becoming westernized. Because most domestic wheat consumption relies on imported wheat, we aimed to evaluate the allergy-inducible protein contents of commercial flours from imported and domestic wheat. Analysis of the protein contents by densitometry suggested that domestic wheat flours contain lower levels of high molecular weight glutenin and omega-gliadin (50 and 34% lower, respectively) than imported wheat flours. Therefore, domestic wheat flours are less likely to cause allergic reactions than imported wheat flours are. Based on the findings of our study, were commend increased consumption of domestic wheat flours to those who are sensitive to allergy.Keywords domestic wheat · gliadin · glutenin · imported wheat · wheat allergy For many years, wheat has been consumed as an important component of bread, pasta, and noodles (Wan et al., 2014). However, allergy-inducible proteins in wheat have been known to cause various food allergies, such as wheat-dependent exerciseinduced anaphylaxis (WDEIA) and celiac disease (Pasha et al., 2013). These proteins are classified into two groups: the albumin/ globulin, water/salt-soluble fraction; and the gluten, water/saltinsoluble fraction (Morita et al., 2009). Gluten fractions are composed of gliadin and glutenin subunits and are known to be the causative agent of wheat-related food allergies (Morita et al., 2009). Among the gliadin types (alpha-, beta-, gamma-, and omega-gliadin), omega-gliadin is mainly responsible for wheatrelated food allergies; and among the glutenin types (high and low molecular weight glutenin [HMW and LMW, respectively]), HMW glutenin is the main culprit (Matsuo et al., 2005;Morita et al., 2009).Despite increased demand for wheat flours in the domestic market, wheat consumption depends heavily on imported wheat flours. Although considerable research on the allergic activity of standardized wheat samples has been performed, there have been few reports of scientific comparative analysis of the allergyinducible components of domestic versus imported wheat in Korea. Thus, we evaluated the major allergy-inducible protein contents of commercial domestic and imported wheat flours. Our results may provide preliminary evidence that domestic wheat has lower allergenic activity than imported wheat.To compare wheat allergy-inducible protein contents in domestic and imported wheat flours, we purchased eight wheat flour samples from a commercial market. We divided the flour samples according to their gluten content (as this determines the flour's use), into strong, medium, and soft flours (Palacios et al., 2004). The samples were further divided into domestic and imported wheat flours (Table 1). Protein contents are presented in Table 1 based on the nutrition labels of the respective products.To extract the total protein in wheat flours, 100 mg of wheat flour was treated with 1 mL of borate extraction buffer (pH 10.0) This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Crea...

Differential induction of allergy responses by low molecular weight wheat proteins from six wheat cultivars

“…Gliadins typically are extracted with alcohol and glutenins are soluble in alkali solutions (Kozai et al 2006). The size of gliadins is between 33 and 67 kDa and that of glutenins is between 75 and 110 kDa (Battais et al 2003;Kim et al 2016). Among gliadins, the size of omega-5 gliadin, which is a major inducer of WDEIA, is between 50 and 67 kDa (Comino et al 2012).…”