Cereals & Grains Association
Log In

Nutrient profiles and antioxidant activities of germinated brown rice and its food products
J. BAO (1), Y. Wang (2), S. Shen (2) (1) Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China; (2) Zhejiang University, , China.

Whole grain rice (brown rice) is of benefit to the health of consumers. Germination of brown rice may further enhance its health benefit compositions in the whole grain rice (brown rice). Dynamic alterations in the polyphenols, tocols, antioxidant activities (AOA), and ?-aminobutyric acid (GABA) contents of white, red, and black germinated brown rice (GBR) upon different germination periods were studied. The results indicated that the contents of the free, bound, and total phenolics and AOA steadily increased during germination, even though the free part of colored GBR showed a notable decline at the earlier stages. The compositions of the nine phenolic acids and six tocols generally accumulated in a time- and variety-dependent manner during the germination process. The GABA in white, red, and black GBR accumulated to the highest content at the end of germination, which was 4.7, 14.2, and 6.7-fold of their respective nongerminated counterparts. We also investigated the effects of anaerobic treatment on these compositions in the GBR. The values of polyphenols and antioxidant capability significantly increased in treated groups, in which the three phenolic acids, i.e ferulic, p-coumaric, and sinapic acids, showed the most pronounced increase. No significant change was observed in tocols. The contents of GABA increased 4.2, 9.7 and 4.8 folds in the white, red and black GBRs, respectively. The results indicated that additional anaerobic treatment could be used in the production of GBR as a functional food.