Himachal Journal of Agricultural Research Vol. 29 (1&2) : 65-69, 2003

Biochemical Evaluation of Promising Rajmash ( Phaseolus vulgaris L.) genotypes of Himachal Pradesh

Smriti Sood, C.P. Awasthi and Nageswer Singh

Deptt. of Chemistry and Biochemistry

CSK H.P. Krishi Vishvavidyalaya, Palampur 176062 H.P.

Abstract

A study to evaluate biochemical constituents of dry mature seeds of ten genotypes of rajmash was carried out during 2000-2001. Significant variations were observed in quality attributes viz moisture, ash, protein, crude fibre, carbohydrates, starch, total sugars, tryptophan, methionine, tannin and polyphenol oxidase activity ranging from 7.17 to 9.54 %, 3.67 to 4.28%, 20.65 to 25.81%, 3.19 to 4.32 %, 63.74 to 70.42%, 42.18 to 51.61%, 9.29 to 10.93%, 0.85 to 1.01 g / 100g protein, 0.62 to 0.96 g / 100g protein, 402 to 569 mg / 100g and 9.08 to 15.83 units / min / g, respectively. Genotypic rating indicated that genotypes Him-I, Jawala, Kanchan, 62-1-P-1 and HPR-207 excelled overall superior genotypes in order of preference as multipurpose promising collections for further crop improvement purposes.

Introduction

Legume seeds are grown and used for food in temperate and tropical areas of the world. They are considered as protein tablets. Since the pulse production in India remained almost stagnant during the last few decades, attempts are being made to augment pulse production technology so as to ensure availability of pulses presently 40g / adult / day to the tune of recommended 70 g in the 21st century. In this context among various members of food legumes common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) also known as rajmash, french bean, kidney bean or field bean seems to hold promise especially in hill agriculture to meet out the challenges of under nutrition to much extent.


India is the major pulse producing country of the world occupying an area of 228.47 lakh hectares with the production of 130.7 lakh tonnes and yield to the tune of 572 kg / hectare (India,2000). In India about 99 lakh hectares area is under this crop of which Himachal Pradesh contributed nearly 2037 hectares. The state produced 19,206 metric tonnes of rajmash as compared to 45.5 lakh metric tonnes in this country (Anonymous, 1999).

Rajmash is cultivated and widely grown in Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir,Uttranchal and parts of Uttar Pradesh. It is widely grown in Kinnaur, Lahual-Spiti, Sirmour, Bilaspur, Solan, Chamba, Mandi and Kangra districts. It is grown as sole crop as well as inter crop with maize in kharif in hills as well as its cultivation is under trial in rabi season in plains. This crop owing to its ability to substantially tolerate to high attitude cold stress is viewed as potential source of protein and other nutrients for supplementary diet for hills in particular. Since systematic information on biochemical charaterization of rajmash of Himachal Pradesh is still scantly, the present study was therefore, undertaken to evaluate quality attributes of rajmash collections in order to identify nutritionally superior genotypes of multiple use.

Materials and Methods

Seed samples of 10 rajmash varieties / genotypes were procured from Regional Research Station, Bajaura, Kullu (H.P.) of this university during the year 2000-2001. Dry mature seeds of rajmash germplasm were cleaned and freed of any extraneous substances and dried in an electric oven at 60±50C. The oven dried samples were ground in a Willy mill to pass through 40-mesh sieve and stored in polythene bags. These samples were properly labelled and kept at room temperature for further analysis. The biochemical constituents such as moisture, ash, crude fibre, protein content were analysed by the method described in A.O.A.C. (1970). Carbohydrate content was determined by Yemm and Willis (1954). Total sugars and starch were extracted in alcohol (80%) by following the procedure of A.O.A.C. (1970) and estimated the same in the test extract by following the phenol sulphuric acid method of Dubois et al., (1956). Among amino acids, methionine and tryptophan were estimated by following the procedure adopted by Horn et al., (1946) and Spies and Chamber (1949), respectively. Tannin content was analysed by the method given by Yu, Ma and Bliss (1978), whereas, polyphenol oxidase activity was determined by the method described by Bastin and Unler (1972). The entire data was analysed statistically by using analysis of variance as given by Panse and Sukhatme (1984).

Results and Discussion

The data pertaining to the biochemical constituents of seeds of various genotypes of rajmash are presented in Table 1. Significant variation in moisture content was noticed to range from 7.17 to 9.54 per cent with its highest value in HPR-224 followed by 62-1-P-1 and HPR - 336. The lowest value was exhibited by Jawala. Significant variability among the mature seeds in this regard might be attributed to variable accumulation of photosynthates and other dietary constituents expressed in terms of grain in dry matter in the seeds. (Gopalan et al.,1993).

Protein content of rajmash collections showed wide variability ranging from 20.65 to 25.81 per cent. Genotype Him-1 exhibited highest value followed by Jawala and Kanchan. Similar trend of variability for protein content in rajmash genotypes have also been reported elsewhere (Sangha et al., 1994 and Samman et al.,1999).

Table 1. Proximate composition of dry mature seeds of rajmash germplasm

Genotypes / Moisture
(%) / Protein
(%) / Ash (%) / Crude Fibre (%) / Carbohydrate (%) / Starch
(%) / Total Sugars(%)
Jawala / 7.17 / 24.28 / 3.18 / 3.23 / 63.74 / 42.18 / 10.93
Him-1 / 7.24 / 25.81 / 3.67 / 3.48 / 65.09 / 49.97 / 10.18
62-1-P-1 / 8.27 / 22.41 / 4.02 / 3.26 / 68.31 / 51.61 / 10.02
Kanchan / 7.30 / 23.57 / 3.94 / 4.17 / 67.42 / 46.34 / 9.53
EC-2236 / 7.98 / 21.83 / 3.98 / 4.32 / 68.21 / 50.48 / 10.91
HPR-124 / 7.39 / 21.39 / 4.28 / 3.25 / 69.42 / 45.06 / 9.78
HPR-207 / 8.09 / 23.28 / 3.90 / 4.02 / 67.80 / 43.84 / 9.62
HPR-224 / 9.54 / 20.65 / 3.78 / 3.87 / 70.42 / 45.11 / 9.76
HPR-336 / 8.25 / 21.79 / 4.02 / 3.19 / 69.87 / 49.74 / 9.91
HPR-505 / 7.62 / 21.96 / 3.73 / 3.51 / 68.82 / 47.62 / 9.29
SE  (d) / 0.039 / 0.44 / 0.032 / 0.029 / 0.62 / 0.75 / 0.029
CD (5%) / 0.083 / 0.93 / 0.067 / 0.061 / 1.30 / 1.57 / 0.061


Ash content varied significantly from 3.67 to 4.28 per cent. It is evident that ash content in HPR-124 showed maximum value followed by 62-1-P-1, HPR-336 and Kanchan. These findings were found more and less in agreement with those reported by other workers (Hsieh et al., 1992 and Samman et al., 1999). The maximum and minimum values with regard to crude fibre content were found in EC-2236 (4.32%) and HPR-336 (3.19%), respectively. The data obtained in relation to crude fibre content in this study are corroborated with the findings of Gopalan et al., 1993 and Singh et al., 1996.

Status of dietary constituents such as carbohydrates, total sugars and starch in mature seeds of rajmash genotypes was observed to vary significantly from 63.74 to 70.42, 9.29 to 10.93 and 42.18 to 51.61 per cent, respectively. The highest value of carbohydrates was found in the genotypes HPR-224 followed by HPR-336 in that order. Genotype Jawala gave the highest value for total sugars, while the genotype 62-1-P-1 emerged superior in starch content. The trend of variability on this aspect in the present study is in agreement with those reported by Gopalan et al., 1993 and Singh et al., 1996.


Among various essential amino acids tryptophan is considered to play an important role in nicotinamide metabolism as well as in other metabolic processes. The amino acid also constitutes one of the essential components of dietary protein. Similarly methionine which is an essential sulphur containing but limiting amino acid in most of the food legumes is considered to be source of transmethylation reactions of vital importance in plants and animals. (Gupta, 1983). As such, variability in tryptophan and methionine content in rajmash germplasm was evaluated and pertinent data in this context are depicted in Table 2. It is apparent that tryptophan and methionine content ranged from 0.85 to 1.01 and 0.62 to 0.96 g /100g protein, respectively. Genotypes Him-1 showed maximum tryptophan content, while the genotype Jawala possessed the highest methionine content followed by Him-1 and Kanchan. The range of variability in respect of these quality attributes observed in the present investigation is in agreement with the findings of other workers in this crop (Sangha et al., 1994 and Singh and Sood, 1997).

Status of prominent antinutritional factor viz. hydrolyzable tannin and variability in polyphenol oxidase activity were also evaluated (Table 2). The genotype having the lowest value for the parameter was identified as Him-1 followed by Jawala and Kanchan in

Table 2. Variability in tryptophan, methionine,

tannin and polyphenol oxidase activity

(PPA) in dry mature seeds of rajmash

germplasm

Geno
types / Trypto
phan
(g/100g protein) / Methio-
nine
(g/100g protein) / Tannin
(mg/
100 ) / PPA
(Unit/min./g)
Jawala / 0.96 / 0.96 / 421 / 15.73
Him-1 / 1.01 / 0.93 / 402 / 11.22
62-1-P-1 / 0.95 / 0.87 / 449 / 13.10
Kanchan / 0.98 / 0.91 / 436 / 15.83
EC-2236 / 0.88 / 0.72 / 487 / 11.44
HPR-124 / 0.85 / 0.71 / 501 / 9.86
HPR-207 / 0.92 / 0.62 / 440 / 11.30
HPR-224 / 0.85 / 0.90 / 569 / 12.32
HPR-336 / 0.88 / 0.79 / 480 / 9.08
HPR-505 / 0.91 / 0.84 / 466 / 11.64
SE  (d) / 0.030 / 0.035 / 2.64 / 0.062
CD (5%) / 0.063 / 0.073 / 5.51 / 0.108

tannin content, whereas genotype HPR-336 exhibited lowest value in polyphenol oxidase activity. Genotypic variation on these aspects observed in present study was in agreement with the findings of other investigators (Barampama and Simard, 1993).

Besides identifying genotypes superior in individual quality traits to be useful for breeding and crop improvement purposes, attempts were made to carry out overall genotypic rating in respect of various quality attributes taken together in order to identify multipurpose collections (Table 3).Thus, overall nutritionally superior genotypes were identified as Him-1, Jawala, Kanchan, 62-1-P-1 and HPR-207 in order of excellence as multipurpose promising rajmash collections.

Table 3. Genotypic rating of rajmash germplasm in search of versatile multipurpose collections

Parameters / Jawala / Him-1 / 62-1-P-1 / Kanchan / EC-2236 / HPR-124 / HPR-207 / HPR-224 / HPR-336 / HPR-505
Protein / 2 / 1 / 5 / 3 / 7 / 9 / 4 / 10 / 8 / 6
Tryptophan / 3 / 1 / 4 / 2 / 7 / 8 / 5 / 8 / 7 / 6
Methionine / 1 / 2 / 5 / 3 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 4 / 7 / 6
Tannin / 2 / 1 / 5 / 3 / 8 / 9 / 4 / 10 / 7 / 6
Total / 8 / 5 / 19 / 11 / 30 / 35 / 23 / 32 / 29 / 24
Cumulative
rating / 2 / 1 / 4 / 3 / 8 / 10 / 5 / 9 / 7 / 6

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