19th Annual Student Research Conference
Science
Development of Low Glycemic Index Popcorn
Eric B. Moore
Dr. Mark Campbell, Faculty Mentor
Obesity and diabetes are major health concerns in this country. Increasing consumption rates of high fructose corn syrup and refined grains are amongst the largest contributors to this national epidemic. The food industry is beginning to address this through the marketing of “diabetic friendly” foods with low glycemic-index (G.I.) foods. This experiment is part on an ongoing project to breed popcorn varieties will low glycemic indices by backcrossing the recessive alleles amylose-extender (ae), sugary-2 (su2) and dull (du). The ae allele will decrease the amylose content and therefore the glycemic index while su2 and du should offset the high cooking temperature required by ae starch. To facilitate this process we investigated a single-kernel analysis based on comparing amylose levels and thermal properties in order to recover desired phenotypes among segregating material for the development of ae, ae su2, ae du and du su2 genotypes.
Keywords: diabetes, glycemic-index , popcorn, backcrossing, amylose, genotype, phenotype
Topic(s):Agricultural Science
Presentation Type: Oral Paper
Session: 8-2
Location: VH 1000
Time: 8:30