284 Antioxidants in wheat and wheat-based breakfast cereals.

Alan J. Baublis (1), Fergus M. Clydesdale (2), and Eric A. DECKER (2). (1) Coca Cola Company, Atlanta, GA; (2) Dept. of Food Science, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA 01003.

Wheat contains a variety of components which could be nutritionally important antioxidants including phytate, dietary fibers and phenolic acids. Of these comounds, the phenolics seem to be the most important antioxidants in wheat due to their ability to inhibit lipid oxidation in both bulk oils and phosphatidylcholine liposomes. The majority of phenolic antioxidants are found in the bran portion of wheat and aqueous extracts of high bran and whole grain cereals are much more effective at inhibiting iron and peroxyl radical promoted oxidation of liposomes than extracts from cereals produced from refined wheat. Aqueous extracts from cereal homogenates that were subjected to simulated gastrointestinal pH treatments exhibit greater antioxidant activity than the untreated aqueous extracts. In addition, extracts from breakfast cereals exhibit greater antioxidant activity than unprocessed wheat. These data indicate that wheat-based cereals contain antioxidants whose activity is enhanced by gastrointestinal conditions and food processing operations suggest that they could be important dietary antioxidants.