On the 2nd, the international scientific journal Nature published the appearance of well ripened oats as the cover. Oats are a type of wheat similar to barley. It is a biennial plant that is native to Central Asia and Armenia, and is also called Lotus or Jakmaek. It is eaten with rice or consumed as oatmeal, a processed oat product. It is low in calories, contains twice as much protein as rice, and is rich in essential amino acids and calcium.
These highly nutritious oats are drought and disease resistant varieties. It grows well in harsh environments and is used all over the world. It is less likely to cause allergic or hypersensitivity reactions compared to other grains. According to Fortune Business Insights, the global oat market is expected to reach $6.99 billion by 2027. However, it is veiled how oats contain so much nutritional value and what evolutionary process they have undergone in spite of their popularity.
A research team led by Professor Nick Siriyov of the Scand Oat Industry Research Center at Lund University in Sweden published the results of genetic analysis on three types of oats this week in Nature. They are a diploid oat species with two pairs of chromosomes, ‘Avena longiglumis’, a tetraploid ‘Avena insularis’, and a hexaploid ‘Avena sativa L’. .
The team’s analysis showed that oats had fewer genes that produce a protein equivalent to wheat gluten. The gene sequence itself was also analyzed to be less likely to cause inflammation. It is analyzed that oats have a similar composition to the genes and proteins of rice compared to other grains.
“Knowing the gene sequence can help us better understand which genes in oats are responsible for which traits,” said the research team.