Effects of Ultrasonic-assisted Treatment on Nutrition and Edible Quality of Germinated Brown Rice

In present study, ultrasonic technology was applied to the processing of germinated brown rice(GBR), and the changes of total flavonoids contents, partial primary nutrients, ultrastructure of bran and textural properties of GBR were analyzed. The results showed that the sequence of ultrasonic-assisted treatment exhibited a certain effect on the content of total flavonoids in germinated brown rice. It was as high as 218.17 mg/100 g under the following processing condition: The brown rice was firstly soaked for 13 h and then treated with 160 W ultrasonic treatment for 25 min before germination processing. Under this condition, the germination potential and germination rate of ultrasonic-assisted germinated brown rice(GBR-U) significantly increased by 19.60%(P<0.01) and 4.66%(P<0.05) respectively compared with the GBR without ultrasonic-assisted treatment; moreover, the contents of protein, vitamin B₂ and some mineral elements (potassium, phosphorus, manganese and zinc) notably increased(P<0.05). The cortex of GBR-U was more porous, the hardness, adhesiveness, springiness and viscosity of GBR-U showed decreasing trend, while no significant difference were observed in thermal properties of starch gelatinization(P˃0.05). The present study suggested that the ultrasonic-assisted processing could improve the nutrition characteristics and edible quality of GBR in a certain degree.