Jo. Offem et al., CHANGES IN LIPID-CONTENT AND COMPOSITION DURING GERMINATION OF GROUNDNUTS, Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture, 62(2), 1993, pp. 147-155
The cotyledons of two varieties of germinating groundnut seeds (Runner
and Bunch) were analysed periodically for their lipid content and fat
ty acid composition over a period of 132 h. The lipid content decrease
d drastically during germination. More drastic changes in lipid consti
tuents were observed for light-grown seedlings than for dark-grown one
s. In general, the non-polar lipids (NPL) were metabolised faster than
the polar ones (P > 0.05) especially in those seeds grown in the dark
. The rate of decrease in NPL content almost paralleled that of increa
se in glycolipid (GL) content. Triacyl glycerol content decreased noti
ceably during germination while other NPL tended to increase. Among th
e GL, sterylglucoside increased rapidly during early germination under
darkness, only to decrease steadily thereafter. A converse effect was
observed for acyl sterylglucoside which, in the dark, decreased rapid
ly at early germination only to increase equally rapidly later on. Amo
ng the phospholipids (PL), only phosphatidic acid showed a marked incr
ease during germination, under both growth conditions, while others te
nded to decrease in varying degrees. The changing patterns of GL and P
L during germination seem to follow the pattern of the formation of ph
otosynthetic tissues and the metabolic conversion of PL. The major fat
ty acids of the three lipid groups, which more or less decreased or in
creased in varying degrees with germination in light-grown seeds were
oleic, linoleic, palmitic, stearic, arachidic and lignoceric acids in
decreasing order of prominence at early germination.