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Centre Projects

• The High Fibre Grains Collaboration Cluster

• Nutrient content of existing pulse and cereal cultivars

• Developing hulless barley for Human Food

• Improving the omega-3 status of Australians via farmed fish, chicken meat and eggs.

• Fighting Gluten intolerance

• Baked products with increased shelf-life from waxy durum flour

• Health Benefits of Omega 3 rich foods in maternal infant health

• Functional foods to avoid infant allergy

• Dietary fish oils to prevent cardiac arrhythmias and to treat chronic inflammatory disorders

• High lutein bread wheat to improve macaluar degeneration

The High Fibre Grains Collaboration Cluster

The High Fibre Grains Collaboration Cluster, funded with $3.6 M cash from the Food Futures Flagship involves: the University of Adelaide- characterisation of genes and enzymes involved in grain polysaccharide synthesis (Professor Geoff Fincher); the University of Queensland- Characterisation of molecular structures formed from polysaccharides in the process of digestion; the University of Melbourne - Molecular fine structure characterization of non-starch polysaccharides; CSIRO - wheat grain quality, human nutrition and wheat genetics. The Universities are contributing $5.6M in kind.

Project: Increasing Fibre in cereal grain for human consumption by increasing the non-starch polysaccharides (beta-glucan) within plant cell walls. These polysaccharides have significant benefits for human health by lowering cholesterol, improving bowel health and reducing glucose release in the small intestine (important for diabetes and obesity related disease.)

Nutrient content of existing pulse and cereal cultivars

There has been a decline in the nutrient content of many processed foods in recent years necessitating replacement through supplementation with specific vitamins and minerals. It is known that there is variation in the level of key vitamins and minerals of pulses and cereals but the extent of this variation is unknown in the seed banks of the University. A formal exploration of pulse and cereal varieties will be carried out to provide vital information to plant breeders to develop grains with improved nutritional value.

Developing hulless barley for Human Food

The Hulless barley breeding program in the School of AFW is developing new varieties of barley specifically bred for food with health promoting characteristics.
Barley provides consumers with a good source of dietary fibre, beta-glucan and antioxidants. Growing and breeding food barley for Australia's dryer climate will provide an opportunity to investigate the nutritional value of barley foods.
Barley food researchers at the Cereal Research Centre, Agriculture & Agri-food Canada, Winnipeg, MB, have investigated a number of successful techniques to produce barley snack foods.
At the University of Adelaide, researchers have investigated the use of hulless barley for rolling and milling (into flour for pita breads). Both end products showed good quality in terms of processing, taste and nutritional content. The hulless barley breeding program is developing both high and low amylase barley for these end uses to producing higher quality nutritional and processing characteristics than normal type barleys and with improved health benefits compared to wheat or rice.

Improving the omega-3 status of Australians via farmed fish, chicken meat and eggs.

Omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (n-3 PUFA) provide a range of health benefits to humans and animals alike. Humans cannot synthesise n-3 PUFA, therefore dietary sources including oily fish is vital. However, many Australians prefer non-oily fish or refuse to eat fish at all. An active research program involving lipid biochemists, molecular biologists and animal physiologists has been created to improve the omega 3 levels in meats that Australians will eat such as chicken and pork and also in farmed fish that are more palatable to Australian consumers. The project further involves oil seed breeders who are attempting to create vegetable oils that will help increase the omega 3 PUFA levels in animals and thus improve the omega 3 statuses of Australians.

Fighting Gluten intolerance

Many food intolerances have been attributed to the presence of the wheat protein known as gluten which is a composite of the proteins gliadin and glutenin. Currently there are research projects based at the Waite campus to develop low-gliadin wheat and barley for the gluten-free food market. There are difficulties in reliably measuring alpha-gliadin thought to be the main cause of allergic responses. To help move the projects forward allergists and immunologists from the Women's and Children's Health Research Institute (WCHRI) have been meeting with the plant breeders to develop in vitro screening assays for allergy and/or tolerance that will be useful to help guide the plant breeders.
This project epitomises the way that health researchers can help plant breeders develop new foods for sufferers of gluten intolerance and new crops for Australian grain growers. Thus Health feeds back to Agriculture.

Baked products with increased shelf-life from waxy durum flour

New types of durum wheat developed on the Waite Campus of the University of Adelaide have a novel waxy starch composition have the capacity to be a "universal system" of delivering sources of nutrition that reduce the fat content of food, whilst maintaining or enhancing the organoleptic quality and shelf-life of baked products. Moreover, substitution of durum flour for fat can reduce the costs of production. The commercial application of the waxy durum flour could include commercial white, wholemeal and grain breads, muffins, muesli bars and low-fat cakes, flatbreads, frozen bread rolls and diabetic baked products.

Health Benefits of Omega 3 rich foods in maternal infant health

Preterm infants are denied an adequate supply of omega 3 long chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (LCPUFA) that are normally accumulated in the brain in large amounts during the last trimester. We have recently conducted a National randomised controlled trial in 650 preterm infants and demonstrated that when omega 3 LCPUFA are in high levels (1% total fat) in breast milk and formula from birth to the normal date of delivery (40 weeks), the level of mild and severe mental delay can be reduced by 50%. The results of this study will give rise to new clinical practices and new commercial products for infants.

Functional foods to avoid infant allergy

Emerging data suggest that dietary n-3 long chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (LCPUFA) have immuno-modulatory benefits on the developing immune system and that these may be greatest in utero and before allergic responses are established.
There are plausible mechanisms by which diets high in n-3 LCPUFA may modulate the development of allergic disease and regulate immune responses. The importance of n-3 LCPUFA has been well described in altering cell membrane, phospholipid, fatty acid profiles and modulating a range of inflammatory events. Furthermore, the substantial shift in dietary fatty acids to favour n-6 over n-3 fatty acids has coincided with the increased prevalence of childhood allergic disease, leading to speculation that the two may be linked.
As a follow-up to a previous trial investigating DHA (an n-3 LCPUFA) to optimise mother infant outcome, the hypothesis that n-3 LCPUFA supplementation in pregnancy will reduce allergies in early childhood can be studied.

Dietary fish oils to prevent cardiac arrhythmias and to treat chronic inflammatory disorders

The primary aim of this study is to test the hypothesis that in patients undergoing elective cardiac surgery, pre-operative loading with n-3 fatty acids is an effective, well tolerated and safe therapy for the prevention of post-operative atrial arrhythmias.
Previous clinical studies using dietary n-3 fatty have provided convincing evidence for a protective effect of dietary n-3 fatty acids in sudden cardiac death which is supported by demonstration of an anti-ventricular arrhythmic effect of n-3 fatty acids in animal models of induced ventricular arrhythmias. Our pilot data also demonstrates a strong anti-arrhythmic effect in inducible ventricular tachycardia in human subjects.
This project will provide new information about the atrial effects of n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids. Preliminary studies have delineated the time course of incorporation of dietary n-3 fatty acids into the atrium in cardiac patients, providing a sound basis for design of the intervention. Results should provide new information about the atrial effects of dietary n-3 fatty acids, and have the potential to provide a low cost in-hospital intervention to address a serious clinical problem; namely, post-cardiac surgery atrial fibrillation.

High lutein bread wheat to improve Macular Degeneration

Bread wheat with luetein content approaching 20ug/g would eliminate the need for colour additives in the manufacture of yellow alkaline noodles and deliver dietary lutein to reduce the incidence of macular degeneration, the major cause of age-related blindness.