Dry legumes are staple and potentially functional food, being a good source of polyphenols, flavonoids, and antioxidant activity. The objective of this study was to determine the total polyphenol content (TPC), total flavonoid content (TFC), and their relation with antioxidant capacity in 17 chickpea lines having colored seed coats (black, red, brown, green, rubiginous, gray, yellow, cream, or beige). The seed coat usually contains more than 95% of these compounds. In this study, both TPC and TFC varied significantly among different lines and were highly correlated to antioxidant activity. Colored seeds contained up to 13-, 11-, and 31-fold more TPC, TFC, and antioxidant activity, respectively, than cream- and beige-color seeds. Thus, colored chickpea could be a potentially functional food in addition to its traditional role of providing dietary proteins and dietary fibers.

SummaryVesicular arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi infect plants by means of both spores and vegetative hyphae at early stages of symbiosis. Using 2500 M2 fast-neutron-mutagenized seeds of the miniature tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum) cultivar, Micro-Tom, we isolated a mutant, M161, that is able to resist colonization in the presence of Glomus intraradices spores. The myc ± phenotype of the mutant was stable for nine generations, and found to segregate as a single Mendelian recessive locus. The mutant exhibited morphological and growth-pattern characteristics similar to those of wild-type plants.Alterations of light intensity and day/night temperatures did not eliminate the myc ± characteristic.Resistance to mycorrhizal fungal infection and colonization was also evident following inoculation with the fungi Glomus mosseae and Gigaspora margarita. Normal colonization of M161 was evident when mutant plants were grown together with arbuscular mycorrhizal-inoculated wild-type plants in the same growth medium. During evaluation of the pre-infection stages in the mutant rhizosphere, spore germination and appressoria formation of G. intraradices were lower by 45 and 70%, respectively, than the rates obtained with wild-type plants. These results reveal a novel, genetically controlled step in the arbuscular mycorrhizal colonization process, governed by at least one gene, which signi®cantly reduces key steps in pre-mycorrhizal infection stages.

ABSTRACT

Peanut skins are a good source of polyphenols, which are a major source of dietary antioxidants. Therefore, the consumption of whole peanut seeds, including the skin, has been recommended by nutritional authorities. Here, the polyphenol contents of the skins of 22 experimental line, varying in skin color, and four Israeli cultivars were examined. The total phenolic (TPC), total flavonoid (TFC), total anthocyanin (TAC) contents and antioxidant capacity (AOC) of isolated skins were measured. Whereas significantly high correlation coefficients were found among the TPC, TFC and AOC, no significant correlations were found between any of these factors and skin color. On the other hand, TAC was significantly correlated with skin color. Our results clearly indicate that the AOC of peanut skins is not directly related to the intensity of their color and that the presence of colorless flavonoids might be the reason for the high AOC of peanut skins. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONSPeanut is the main summer legume crop in Israel. Recently, in response to strong demand among the European public for food products with added health value, breeders have considered developing peanut lines as functional foods. Peanut seed coats contain large amounts of important polyphenolic compounds. For this reason, peanuts are considered to be a good functional food when consumed as whole seeds. In order to determine the functional food potential of Israeli peanuts, the variability and relations of total phenolic content (TPC), total flavonoid content (TFC), total anthocyanin content (TAC) and antioxidant capacity (AOC) among these and other imported peanut lines with a wide range of skin colors were evaluated. While significant correlations were found between TAC and skin color, no significant correlations were found between the other polyphenolic factors or AOC and peanut skin color. Actually, the Israeli cultivars that have light pink skins were found to have higher TPC, TFC and AOC than most of the lines with red, purple or white skins. This finding demonstrates that the high AOC of the Israeli cultivars is due to colorless compounds, a notion that should be taken into consideration in breeding programs aiming to integrate elevated AOC of the skin with other favorable traits.bs_bs_banner Journal of Food Biochemistry

SummaryWith the aim of increasing the methionine level in alfalfa ( Medicago sativa L.) and thus improving its nutritional quality, we produced transgenic alfalfa plants that expressed the Arabidopsis cystathionine γ -synthase (AtCGS), the enzyme that controls the synthesis of the first intermediate metabolite in the methionine pathway. The At CGS cDNA was driven by the Arabidopsis rubisco small subunit promoter to obtain expression in leaves. Thirty transgenic plants were examined for the transgene protein expression, and four lines with a high expression level were selected for further work. In these lines, the contents of methionine, S -methylmethionine (SMM), and methionine incorporated into the water-soluble protein fraction increased up to 32-fold, 19-fold, and 2.2-fold, respectively, compared with that in wild-type plants. Notably, in these four transgenic lines, the levels of free cysteine (the sulphur donor for methionine synthesis), glutathione (the cysteine storage and transport form), and protein-bound cysteine increased up to 2.6-fold, 5.5-fold, and 2.3-fold, respectively, relative to that in wild-type plants. As the transgenic alfalfa plants over-expressing AtCGS had significantly higher levels of both soluble and protein-bound methionine and cysteine, they may represent a model and target system for improving the nutritional quality of forage crops.

Chickpea lines with colored testa (seed coat) contain high levels of polyphenolic compounds that exhibit high levels of antioxidant activity. In a previous study, we showed that common processing procedures, such as soaking and cooking, decrease the levels of these bioactive compounds and subsequent overall antioxidant activity. The observed reduction in total phenolic content was due to the movement of polyphenols from the seed coat to the soaking or cooking water. Here, the effects of baking, roasting and frying processes were examined in relation to total phenolic content (TPC), total flavonoid content (TFC) and ferric-reducing ability of plasma antioxidant activity (FRAP AA) of colored chickpea seeds. Baked, fried and roasted colored chickpea seeds had significantly higher levels of TPC, TFC and FRAP AA than regular cream- and beige-colored seeds subjected to the same treatments. In contrast to our previous results with soaking and cooking, baking, frying and roasting retained most of the TPC, TFC and FRAP AA in the final products. Thus, colored chickpeas subjected to these three processing methods might be considered a functional food in addition to its traditional role of providing dietary proteins

Seeds with colored testa (seed coat) contain high concentrations of polyphenolic compounds that exhibit high levels of antioxidant activity. Common processing procedures, such as cooking and baking, decrease the levels of these bioactive compounds and consequently, overall antioxidant activity. Here, the effects of baking and cooking processes were examined on total phenolic content (TPC), total flavonoid content (TFC) and ferric-reducing ability of plasma antioxidant activity (FRAP AA) of red and yellow quinoa seeds. Our results indicate that red quinoa seed contains significantly higher levels of TPC, TFC and FRAP AA than yellow quinoa seeds. In addition, cooked and baked quinoa seeds retain most of their TPC, TFC and FRAP AA in the final product. Thus, red quinoa seeds processed by these two methods might be considered a functional food, in addition to its traditional role of providing dietary proteins. Due to their high antioxidant activity, red quinoa seeds might also contribute significantly to the management and/or prevention of degenerative diseases associated with free radical damage

With the general aim of elevating the content of the essential amino acid methionine in vegetative tissues of plants, alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.) and tobacco plants, as well as BY2 tobacco suspension cells, were transformed with a beta-zein::3HA gene under the 35S promoter of cauliflower mosaic virus encoding a rumen-stable methionine-rich storage protein of 15 kDa zein. To examine whether soluble methionine content limited the accumulation of the 15 kDa zein::3HA, methionine was first added to the growth medium of the different transgenic plants and the level of the alien protein was determined. Results demonstrated that the added methionine enhanced the accumulation of the 15 kDa zein::3HA in transgenic alfalfa and tobacco BY2 cells, but not in whole transgenic tobacco plants. Next, the endogenous levels of methionine were elevated in the transgenic tobacco and alfalfa plants by crossing them with plants expressing the Arabidopsis cystathionine gamma-synthase (AtCGS) having significantly higher levels of soluble methionine in their leaves. Compared with plants expressing only the 15 kDa zein::3HA, transgenic alfalfa co-expressing both alien genes showed significantly enhanced levels of this protein concurrently with a reduction in the soluble methionine content, thus implying that soluble methionine was incorporated into the 15 kDa zein::3HA. Similar phenomena also occurred in tobacco, but were considerably less pronounced. The results demonstrate that the accumulation of the 15 kDa zein::3HA is regulated in a species-specific manner and that soluble methionine plays a major role in the accumulation of the 15 kDa zein in some plant species but less so in others.