Tocopherol, phytosterol and phospholipid compositions of new high oleic peanut cultivars

Conventional breeding is widely used for modification of various crop and oilseed traits such as fatty acid composition and disease resistance. The effect of these modifications on the nutritionally beneficial bioactive plant components is usually overlooked unless these components are the specific targets for the modifications. The objective of this study was to examine the effect of breeding on nutritionally beneficial bioactive peanut components. The modified peanut lines Tamrun OL 01, Tamrun OL 02, TX977164 and TX977239 were analyzed for their tocopherol, phytosterol, and phospholipid compositions. Sunoleic and Tamrun 96 were the parent lines of these breeding lines. Parent lines were used as controls to examine the compositional changes resulting from breeding. The experimental results indicated that these peanut breeding lines were rich in α-tocopherol. Tamrun OL 01 had the highest total phytosterol content among the peanut breeding lines examined in this study. All the breeding lines were rich in phosphatidylcholine. Although there were some statistical differences in chemical composition among the peanut breeding lines, these variations were within the range reported for traditional peanut varieties.