The Free-Amino-Acid Content in Six Potatoes Cultivars through Storage

Deciphering agronomic traits, biochemical components, and color in unique green-seeded fenugreek (Trigonella foenum-graecum L.) genotypes

Fenugreek is a high-value legume known for its potential to enhance human health and combat a variety of diseases and metabolic disorders. This versatile crop has demonstrated promising therapeutic effects in managing obesity, diabetes, cancer, and poor metabolism conditions that have become major global health concerns. Despite the availability of multiple pharmaceutical remedies for these ailments in the market, often times the heavy chemical doses are accompanied by side effects on human body. To investigate the agronomic traits, medicinal potential, and color of fenugreek seeds, this study was conducted and identified fenugreek genotypes with green seed color (GSF1 to GSF10), which can prevent the progression of aforementioned diseases without the hassle of side effects. Ten unique green-seeded fenugreek (GSF) genotypes were compared with five released varieties (yellow-seeded fenugreek; YSF1 to YSF5) as check. The genotypes were assessed during rabi season for 3 consecutive years (2021-22 to 2023-24) in semi-arid Eastern Plain Zone of Rajasthan, India. The findings exhibited that agronomically GSF performed well, almost at par with the YSF. Harvest index (23.21 ± 0.37%) is higher in GSF with very marginal differences in other agronomic traits. The medicinal potential of the GSF showed that GSF6 has nearly 1.5 to 2 times higher insulinotropic 4-hydroxyisoleucine (0.90%) levels compared to the YSF genotypes. This unique non-protein branched amino acid is found in fenugreek seeds. GSF1 has a high concentration of chlorophyll (0.45 mg/100 g), GSF10 has low diosgenin and high 4-OHIle (261.80 mg/100 g and 0.85%, respectively), and GSF9 has low total soluble sugars (TSS; 3.50%). Oil content, phenols, and proteins were found to be higher in GSF making it preferable over YSF. The study further revealed that darkness of green color in the seed is directly related to its chlorophyll content and is directly associated with higher content of 4-OHIle and lower TSS. Among the studied genotypes, harvest index is higher in green-seeded genotypes with maximum seed yield (2473.74 Kg/ha) in genotype GSF8. The superior genotypes GSF1, GSF6, GSF8, GSF9, and GSF10 developed in the study hold potential for future breeding initiatives, aimed at boosting medicinal value, nutritional quality, and productivity.

Metabolomic Analysis of Flavour Development in Mung Bean Foods: Impact of Thermal Processing and Storage on Precursor and Volatile Compounds

Consumers prefer mung beans for their low allergenicity and nutritional benefits. However, flavour development in mung bean foods has been problematic, with beany flavour being a limiting factor. Hot processing is crucial in forming mung bean flavours, and storage-induced changes in flavour precursors directly impact the taste post-processing. This study used metabolomics to analyse the effects of hot processing (baking and cooking) on mung bean flavour and differences after storage. A total of 131 flavour precursors and 45 volatile substances were identified across six sample groups. The results showed that baking and cooking upregulated 22 and 18 volatile substances (ketones, aldehydes, esters, pyridine, pyrazines, etc.), respectively. The Maillard reaction during baking notably increased compounds like 2-hydroxypyridine, 2-methoxy-3-isobutyl pyrazine, 1,2-hexanedione, and 2,3-butanedione. Both methods inhibited linoleic acid oxidation, significantly reducing hexanal content, a key "bean" odour substance. However, storage accelerated linoleic acid conversion to C13 peroxides, increasing hexanal content and bean odour. This process decreased precursor substances like glucose-1-phosphate and caused the accumulation of pyruvic acid intermediates in pentose phosphate and pyruvate metabolism/amino acid metabolism pathways, leading to reduced mung bean taste richness.

L-asparaginase-mediated pH shift and carbon dot fluorescence modulation: A sensitive ratiometric method for quantifying L-asparagine in diverse potato varieties under variable storage conditions

This study presents a novel and selective method for the determination of l-asparagine in diverse potato varieties under various storage conditions. L-asparagine levels serve as a crucial indicator for acrylamide formation, a hazardous substance in processed potato products. The fluorometric method utilized blue-emitting CDs (B-CDs), orange-emitting CDs (O-CDs), and the enzyme L-asparaginase for ratiometric detection of L-asparagine. Upon enzymatic hydrolysis of L-asparagine by L-asparaginase, liberated ammonia induced a pH increase in the reaction medium. This pH shift enhanced the fluorescence of B-CDs while simultaneously decreasing that of O-CDs, enabling sensitive and selective L-asparagine quantification. Comprehensive characterization of the CDs was performed using various spectroscopic techniques and transmission electron microscopy. The method demonstrated excellent sensitivity (LOD = 0.31 μM) and a wide linear range (1.0-50.0 μM). When the method was applied to potato samples, high recovery values (98.00-100.33 %) with low relative standard deviations (RSDs) were achieved, confirming the accuracy and precision of the method. The approach was employed to determine L-asparagine levels in three potato varieties (Lady Rosetta, Spunta, and Nicola) under different storage temperatures and durations. This method provides a valuable tool for monitoring L-asparagine content in potatoes, potentially aiding in the mitigation of acrylamide formation during processing. The robust performance and simplicity of the proposed technique make it suitable for routine analysis in both research and industrial applications within the potato industry.

Biofortification of potato nutrition

BACKGROUND

Potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) is the fourth most important food crop after rice, wheat and maize in the world with the potential to feed the world's population, and potato is a major staple food in many countries. Currently, potato is grown in more than 100 countries and is consumed by more than 1 billion people worldwide, and the global annual output exceeds 300 million tons. With the rapid increase in the global population, potato will play a key role in food supply. These aspects have driven scientists to genetically engineer potato for yield and nutrition improvement.

AIM OF REVIEW

Potato is an excellent source of carbohydrates, rich in vitamins, phenols and minerals. At present, the nutritional fortification of potato has made remarkable progress, and the biomass and nutrient compositions of potato have been significantly improved through agronomic operation and genetic improvement. This review aims to summarize recent advances in the nutritional fortification of potato protein, lipid and vitamin, and provides new insights for future potato research.

KEY SCIENTIFIC CONCEPTS OF REVIEW

This review comprehensively summarizes the biofortification of potato five nutrients from protein, lipid, starch, vitamin to mineral. Meanwhile, we also discuss the multilayered insights in the prospects of edible potato fruit, vaccines and high-value products synthesis, and diploid potato seeds reproduction.

Analysis of the Free Amino Acid Profile of Barley Grain from Organic Fertilisation with Ash from Biomass Combustion

Fertilisation with ash from biomass combustion has a positive effect on the quality of nutrients in agrifood raw materials, improving their chemical composition and bioavailability. In the experiments carried out, the protein content and the profile of free amino acids in barley flour were examined from cultivation fertilised with biomass ash at various doses. Barley flour from Haplic Luvisol soil was characterised by a significantly higher (by 13.8% on average) total protein content compared to flour obtained from grains from Gleyic Chernozem soil. The highest protein content but a low content of free amino acids were found in the grains of plants fertilised with the mineral NPK (D1). An increase in the total pool of free amino acids in flour was observed, especially in the case of Haplic Luvisol soil. On average, after fertilising, significantly more ASP, ASN, GLU, GLY, ALA, and CYS were obtained in variant D4 (1.5 t·ha-1), and there were also significantly more TAU and GABA than in the control, up by 30.2% and 23%, respectively. A beneficial effect of fertilisation on the essential amino acid content in barley flour was found, but only up to the dose of D4, when it was significantly higher than in the control and under mineral fertilising (D1), up by 23.7% and 9.2%, respectively. High ash doses reduced the content of free amino acids in the tested barley flour. This study confirmed that using an alternative method of fertilising with plant biomass ash has a beneficial effect on protein quality and nutritional value.

Genetic architecture of tuber-bound free amino acids in potato and effect of growing environment on the amino acid content

Free amino acids in potato tubers contribute to their nutritional value and processing quality. Exploring the natural variation in their accumulation in tubers across diverse genetic backgrounds is critical to potato breeding programs aiming to enhance or partition their distribution effectively. This study assessed variation in the tuber-bound free amino acids in a diversity panel of tetraploid potato clones developed and maintained by the Texas A&M Potato Breeding Program to explore their genetic basis and to obtain genomic-estimated breeding values for applied breeding purposes. Free amino acids content was evaluated in tubers of 217 tetraploid potato clones collected from Dalhart, Texas in 2019 and 2020, and Springlake, Texas in 2020. Most tuber amino acids were not affected by growing location, except histidine and proline, which were significantly lower (- 59.0%) and higher (+ 129.0%), respectively, at Springlake, Texas (a location that regularly suffers from abiotic stresses, mainly high-temperature stress). Single nucleotide polymorphism markers were used for genome-wide association studies and genomic selection of clones based on amino acid content. Most amino acids showed significant variations among potato clones and moderate to high heritabilities. Principal component analysis separated fresh from processing potato market classes based on amino acids distribution patterns. Genome-wide association studies discovered 33 QTL associated with 13 free amino acids. Genomic-estimated breeding values were calculated and are recommended for practical potato breeding applications to select parents and advance clones with the desired free amino acid content.

Metabolic Profiling of Bulgarian Potato Cultivars

Potatoes (Solanum tuberosum L.) are the fourth most economically important crop in the world. They have a short period of vegetation and are an excellent source of carbohydrates, amino acids, vitamins, organic acids, minerals and phenolics as antioxidant substances. Potato can be a major dietary source of various bioactive compounds. In this study, we applied gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC-MS) metabolite profiling to classify eight Bulgarian potato cultivars bred in the Maritsa Vegetable Crops Research Institute (VCRI), Plovdiv, according to their metabolite contents. Altogether, we determine their flavonoids/phenolics to evaluate their nutritive quality for the breeding program with the target of determining strong health-promoting compounds. The “Kalina” cultivar is highlighted as the best one with the highest number of metabolites, containing 14 out of the 26 evaluated; it was selected as the highest-quality cultivar, compared with the other seven cultivars studied. According to the grouping of the cultivars in principal component analysis PCA, their positive distribution is explained mainly by them having the highest contents of aminobutyric and isocitric acids, methionine and alanine and lower levels of fumaric acid, pyroglutamic acid and glycine, in contrast to the cultivars distributed negatively, which had high contents of carbohydrates and relatively low contents of most of the amino acids. The highest number of amino acids was found in the cultivar “Kalina”, followed by “Perun” and “Bor”. The highest number of carbohydrates was found in “Pavelsko” and “Iverce”, while the prominent accumulation of organic acids was found in “Kalina”, “Bor” and “Rozhen”. The highest number of flavonoids in the flesh of the tubers was found in the cultivars “Nadezhda” and “Pavelsko”, followed by “Bor”. The highest ratio of flavonoids/phenolics in the flesh was found in “Pavelsko” and in “Nadezhda”, followed by “Iverce”.

Exceptionally versatile take II: post-translational modifications of lysine and their impact on bacterial physiology

Among the 22 proteinogenic amino acids, lysine sticks out due to its unparalleled chemical diversity of post-translational modifications. This results in a wide range of possibilities to influence protein function and hence modulate cellular physiology. Concomitantly, lysine derivatives form a metabolic reservoir that can confer selective advantages to those organisms that can utilize it. In this review, we provide examples of selected lysine modifications and describe their role in bacterial physiology.

GC-MS- and NMR-Based Metabolomics and Molecular Docking Reveal the Potential Alpha-Glucosidase Inhibitors from Psychotria malayana Jack Leaves

Psychotria malayana Jack leaf, known in Indonesia as "daun salung", is traditionally used for the treatment of diabetes and other diseases. Despite its potential, the phytochemical study related to its anti-diabetic activity is still lacking. Thus, this study aimed to identify putative inhibitors of α-glucosidase, a prominent enzyme contributing to diabetes type 2 in P. malayana leaf extract using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS)- and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR)-based metabolomics, and to investigate the molecular interaction between those inhibitors and the enzyme through in silico approach. Twenty samples were extracted with different solvent ratios of methanol-water (0, 25, 50, 75, and 100% v/v). All extracts were tested on the alpha-glucosidase inhibition (AGI) assay and analyzed using GC-MS and NMR. Multivariate data analysis through a partial least square (PLS) and orthogonal partial square (OPLS) models were developed in order to correlate the metabolite profile and the bioactivity leading to the annotation of the putative bioactive compounds in the plant extracts. A total of ten putative bioactive compounds were identified and some of them reported in this plant for the first time, namely 1,3,5-benzenetriol (1); palmitic acid (2); cholesta-7,9(11)-diene-3-ol (3); 1-monopalmitin (4); β-tocopherol (5); α-tocopherol (6); 24-epicampesterol (7); stigmast-5-ene (8); 4-hydroxyphenylpyruvic acid (10); and glutamine (11). For the evaluation of the potential binding modes between the inhibitors and protein, the in silico study via molecular docking was performed where the crystal structure of Saccharomyces cerevisiae isomaltase (PDB code: 3A4A) was used. Ten amino acid residues, namely ASP352, HIE351, GLN182, ARG442, ASH215, SER311, ARG213, GLH277, GLN279, and PRO312 established hydrogen bond in the docked complex, as well as hydrophobic interaction of other amino acid residues with the putative compounds. The α-glucosidase inhibitors showed moderate to high binding affinities (-5.5 to -9.4 kcal/mol) towards the active site of the enzymatic protein, where compounds 3, 5, and 8 showed higher binding affinity compared to both quercetin and control ligand.

A Novel Ultrasound-Assisted Extraction Method for the Analysis of Anthocyanins in Potatoes (Solanum tuberosum L.)

Purple potato is one of the least known and consumed potato varieties. It is as rich in nutrients, amino acids and starches as the rest of the potato varieties, but it also exhibits a high content of anthocyanins, which confer it with some attractive health-related properties, such as antioxidant, pain-relieving, anti-inflammatory and other promising properties regarding the treatment of certain diseases. A novel methodology based on ultrasound-assisted extraction has been optimized to achieve greater yields of anthocyanins. Optimal extraction values have been established at 70 °C using 20 mL of a 60% MeOH:H₂O solution, with a pH of 2.90 and a 0.5 s⁻¹ cycle length at 70% of the maximum amplitude for 15 min. The repeatability and intermediate precision of the extraction method have been proven by its relative standard deviation (RSD) below 5%. The method has been tested on Vitelotte, Double Fun, Highland and Violet Queen potatoes and has demonstrated its suitability for the extraction and quantification of the anthocyanins found in these potato varieties, which exhibit notable content differences. Finally, the antioxidant capacity of these potato varieties has been determined by means of 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DDPH) radical scavenging and the values obtained were similar to those previously reported in the literature.

Potato Industry By-Products as a Source of Protein with Beneficial Nutritional, Functional, Health-Promoting and Antimicrobial Properties

Most potato proteins are fractions of albumin and globulin, soluble in water and in water and salt solutions, respectively; these are patatin glycoproteins, with a pIs in the range of 4.8–5.2. This group of proteins is typical of potato and they are referred to as patatin or tuberin. Around 30–50% of soluble potato proteins comprise numerous fractions of protease inhibitors with a molecular weight in the range of 7–21 kDa; they are often heat-resistant, showing a wide spectrum of health-promoting effects. The nutritional value of proteins is related to the content of amino acids, their mutual proportions and digestibility. Natural proteins of the patatin fraction are characterized by favorable functional properties, including foam formation and stabilization, fat emulsification or gelling. Native potato proteins may also exhibit beneficial non-food properties, such as antimicrobial or antitumor, as well as antioxidant and antiradical. Depending on the method of isolation and the applied factors, such as pH, ionic strength and temperature, the directions of using potato protein preparations will be different.