For the first time in thousands of years: colored cereal grains as the functional food of the future
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.15407/visn2025.07.007Keywords:
colored grains, wheat, naked barley, anthocyanins, carotenoids, antioxidants, food functionality.Abstract
The article contains a scientific justification for a new direction for Ukraine in the breeding of wheat and naked barley with colored (black, purple, blue) grains in order to improve (biofortification) the nutritional (biological) value of the grain of these crops. Cereal grains are the basis of the world population's nutrition, and the strategy of biofortification of cereal grains is today called the "second green revolution".
The black, blue and purple color of cereal grains is caused by the pigments anthocyanins and phytomelanins, which have high antioxidant activity and, according to the classification, belong to the group of plant flavonoids. These are part of an even larger group of phytochemical components of grain — bioactive phenolic compounds. The yellow color of the endosperm is caused by carotenoid pigments from the group of tetraterpenoid pigments, which are also antioxidants.
Bioactive pigments anthocyanins of colored fruits, vegetables, legumes and colored cereals, together with carotenoids, are able to provide humans with nutritional prevention of a number of serious diseases, such as cardiovascular pathologies, diabetes, various forms of cancer. Therefore, these products are becoming increasingly popular among the population of developed countries of the world.
The article provides examples of unique varieties of wheat and edible naked barley with colored grain created by the authors, which are currently being introduced in Ukraine into the industrial production of functional food products valuable for health. It is emphasized that over thousands of years of wheat’s existence, its grain has never had blue, purple, black colors, and, accordingly, such a high nutritional functionality of the grain. Genes encoding the unique colors of cultivated wheat grain were transferred to its genome from wild relative species.
The authors of the article are the first scientific team in Ukraine to create and bring to the State Register a variety of black wheat with high biological value of grain and initiated a new direction for Ukraine in the selection of varieties of colored wheat and naked barley. These varieties should become the basis for the creation of new functional food products on the food market of Ukraine.
The authors of the article propose, following the example of developed countries of the world, to develop a national strategy for healthy (functional) nutrition in Ukraine, aimed at the maximum (not less than 50%) increase in the share of whole grain cereal products in the diet of the population of Ukraine.
The scientific innovations of the authors of the article concern such branches of grain processing in Ukraine as the production of flour, bread, bread products and cereals.
Cite this article:
Rybalka O.I., Morhun V.V., Morgun B.V., Polishchuk S.S. For the first time in thousands of years: colored cereal grains as the functional food of the future. Visn. Nac. Akad. Nauk Ukr. 2025. (7): 7—27. https://doi.org/10.15407/visn2025.07.007
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