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A Rapid General Method for Appraising the Rheological Properties of the Starchy Endosperm of Cereal Grains¹

¹This work was funded by a grant from the French Agence de l'Environnement et de la Maîtrise de l'Energie, AGRICE program. ²Laboratoire de Mécanique et Génie civil, UMR 5508 CNRS, Université Montpellier II, cc 034, Place E. Bataillon, 34095 Montpellier cedex 5, France. ³Unité de Technologie des Céréales et des Agropolymères, INRA-ENSA, 2 place Viala, 34060 Montpellier Cedex 1, France. Corresponding author. E-mail: abecassi@ensam.inra.fr

A rapid, simple method was developed to prepare small, parallelepipedal test samples of endosperm of wheat, corn, and rice grains. Compression tests performed on endosperm samples revealed the following mechanical properties: modulus of elasticity (E, GPa), breaking stress (σ_rup, MPa), and maximum breaking strain (ε_rup, %). All tests were performed on several endosperm test samples of each cereal species. The results displayed good repeatability and several significant differences in the mechanical behavior of different endosperm structures, especially among soft, hard, and durum wheats. Rice and corn endosperm displayed mechanical behavior similar to that of durum wheat endosperm. The method proposed appears to be sufficiently sensitive and repeatable for studying the incidence of hardness and vitreousness of cereal grain endosperm in relation to its suitability for milling.