Cultivar and Year-to-Year Variation of Phytosterol Content in Rye (Secale cereale L.)

Abstract

Intake of phytosterols (and -stanols) has been shown to decrease the level of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol and thus protect against development of cardiovascular diseases. Therefore, studies on the cultivar and year-to-year variation in phytosterol content in rye grains have been performed. The phytosterol content and composition of different rye cultivars, grown under identical conditions on the same field in three consecutive years, were analyzed. Both cultivar and year-to-year variation in sterol content were statistically significant (p < 0.0001). The total sterol content varied from 1007 ( 21 mg/kg in the highest yielding cultivar, Tsulpan 3, to 761 ( 10 mg/kg in the lowest yielding cultivar (Amando in the 1999 harvest). Because the meteorological conditions varied substantially between the different years, it was possible to deduce the impact of varying weather conditions on phytosterol content in the different cultivars. The studied cultivars had all the lowest phytosterol contents in the dry and warm harvest season of 1999. Although there were statistically significant cultivar and yearto-year variations in the sterol composition (p < 0.0001), these were only between 2 and 4% of the total sterol content.

Phytosterol, Squalene, Tocopherol Content and Fatty Acid Profile of Selected Seeds, Grains, and Legumes

“…In order to maximize the content of phytosterols, squalene and tocopherols in plant foods, it is important to consider factors such as processing conditions, cultivar, growing season and planting location [25,[38][39][40][41][42][43]. In addition, enhanced contents of these bioactive components may be achieved through crop engineering [44][45][46].…”

Tetraploid Wheats: Valuable Source of Phytosterols and Phytostanols

“…It seems, based on clinical experiments, that phytostanols are more efficient [24]. Phytosterols content in common cereal grains and their by-products have been extensively studied [6,10,23,[25][26][27][28][29]. Most of these reports studied sterol content on commercial samples, which considerably limits source traceability.…”

“…Among the compounds exanimated in the European HEALTHGRAIN project, phytosterols contents in common cereal grains took an important place. A large variability of sterols content was found in Triticum aestivum, T. spelta, T. turgidum var durum, T. turgidum var dicoccum, T. monococcum [11,[30][31][32], barley [33], Oat [25,34], rye [26,35]. Several reports have studied seed sterol content of a collection of durum and emmer wheats genotypes [11,[30][31][32]36].…”

Variability of Phytosterols in Jatropha curcas Germplasm

“…Phytosterol content was significantly (t = 20.1, P \ 0.01) higher in November (2,824 mg kg -1 ) than in August (2,090 mg kg -1 ), whereas phytosterol composition was also markedly different in both environments. Seeds collected in November had less campesterol (6.5 % compared to 7.0 %, t = 2.3, P \ 0.05), stigmasterol (7.2 % compared to 10.6 %, t = 18.7, P \ 0.01), and D 7 -stigmastenol (2.4 % compared to 4.3 %, t = 4.6, P \ 0.01) and [18]. Conversely, studies in oil crops such as canola, soybean and sunflower reported that phytosterol content increases with higher temperatures [19][20][21].…”