Developing high beta-glucan barley as a sustainable healthy wholegrain food

春大麦在可持续轮作中发挥着重要作用，与冬小麦相比，它需要较少的氮肥、除草剂、杀菌剂和植物生长调节剂，有利于野生动物越冬留茬或利用覆盖作物。近年来，英国春季大麦种植面积有所增加，主要是为了帮助控制黑草，这是一种主要在秋季发芽的杂草。英国每年生产超过700万吨大麦，主要用于动物饲料、酿造、蒸馏和出口。食品业几乎不使用大麦，尽管大麦可以提供与燕麦同等的健康益处。这在很大程度上是由于β-葡聚糖的内在高水平：一种非淀粉、非纤维素的多糖，存在于谷物的细胞壁中。这在人类的小肠中仍未被消化，作为一种可溶性纤维，通过积极降低血液胆固醇和减缓餐后葡萄糖的释放，对饮食健康有显著的好处。新的大麦食品市场将为农民提供价值更高的现有作物市场，并通过降低2型糖尿病和心血管疾病的风险来改善人口健康，从而提高经济和社会的可持续性。我们的项目旨在通过增加我们对影响β-葡聚糖水平的遗传和环境因素的了解，支持将更健康的全麦大麦作为食品成分的发展。

Spring barley plays an important role in sustainable rotations, requiring lower inputs of nitrogen fertilizer, herbicides, fungicides and plant growth regulators than winter wheat and facilitates either over-winter stubbles for wildlife or use of cover crops. In recent years there has been an increase in the spring barley area in England, mainly to help control black-grass, a predominately autumn-germinating weed. The UK produces over 7m tonnes of barley each year, predominantly for use in animal feed, brewing, distilling and export. The food industry uses little barley even though barley can deliver equivalent health benefits to oats. These are largely due to inherently high levels of beta-glucan: a non-starch, non-cellulosic polysaccharide which is found in the cell walls of cereal grains. This remains undigested in the human small intestine, acting as a soluble fibre which confers significant dietary health benefits, through actively lowering blood cholesterol and slowing post-prandial glucose release. New food markets for barley would increase economic and social sustainability by providing farmers with higher value markets for an established crop, and by improving population health by reducing risk of type-2 diabetes and cardio-vascular disease. Our project aims to support the development of healthier wholegrain barley as a food ingredient, by increasing our understanding of the genetic and environmental factors that can impact on beta-glucan levels.