By raising awareness of the importance of a healthy diet and the impact of food on health, there is a growing demand for food and food products that have an increased beneficial effect on human health. Consequently, part of agricultural production is directed towards food production of improved characteristics and the production of functional foods. Functional food is a food that, besides its nutritional effect, also has a positive effect on some functions in the human body. The simplest form of functional foods are foods that naturally contain a high content of substances that have a positive effect on human health. For example, tomato is considered as a natural functional food because, among other things, it’s lycopene contents, which has been found to have a positive therapeutic effect in the treatment of cardiovascular diseases. From the aspect of agricultural crop production, the biofortification of wheat is accepted as an agronomic measure of grain enrichment with minerals and vitamins. Such enriched products are functional foods, and belonging to a group of enriched and improved agricultural products. Although wheat is mainly used for grain production, flour for milling and processing industry, it can be also used as wheatgrass. Wheatgrass represents young shoots of the species of genus Triticum, which are cultivated and used in a form of dietary supplements as fresh juice, powders or tablets. Wheatgrass contains high concentrations of chlorophylls, bioflavonoids, essential amino acids, vitamins, and minerals and has high antioxidant activity. Benefits of wheatgrass were first mentioned in the 1930th when US chemist and agronomist Charles F. Schnabel patented wheatgrass food supplement rich in chlorophyll. One of the most important properties of wheatgrass is high chlorophyll content. Due to the similarity of the chemical structure of chlorophyll and hemoglobin, a diet rich in chlorophyll has a significant effect on the detoxification of the organism, improvement of blood image and strengthening of immunity. Foods with high antioxidant potential, including wheatgrass, have a significant role in preventing various diseases associated with oxidative stress. Due to the high content of bioflavonoids and the high antioxidant activity of wheatgrass, its effect on cell lines of various human cancers was studied where the antiproliferative effect of wheatgrass was determined.
In the proposed study we will investigate:
(1) the genotype specificity of wheatgrass regarding the in vitro bioavailability of Zn, Fe, Se, Mn, Mg, Ca, K and Na, antioxidant activity and chloroplast pigment content,
2) the influence of zinc and selenium biofortification on mineral composition, antioxidant activity and content of chloroplast pigments;
(3) select wheatgrass genotypes for cultivation and for the recommendation for usage in the form of powder or fresh juice,
(4) the antiproliferative effect of wheatgrass extracts on human tumor cell lines.
A genotype specificity will be tested on a set of 100 wheat genotypes of different origins. Based on the results of genotype specificity testing, 10 genotypes will be selected for investigation of the effect of zinc and selenium biofortification on examined traits in wheatgrass. Investigation of the antiproliferative effect of wheatgrass extracts will be performed on 5 human tumor cell lines.
