Using a favorite starch extraction method to survey the amylose content in naked barley (hordeum vulgare nudum) lines

Starch of two lines of naked barley was extracted by three different methods of washing. The apparent amylose content was determined with the same standard method, which recently has been modified for use with samples of 2-3 seeds of cereal. In the present experiment a factorial design (2 x 3 x 3) was used. The starch was extracted by soaking the seeds overnight in dilute 0.2M ammonia solution grinding in 0.5M NaCl solution in a microfuge tube with an appropriate pestle and decanting the starch slurry. Then it was washed in 4M NaCI, SDS 5% and acetone. The results of apparent amylose content of this method statistically were better than the two others. With present selected method the apparent amylose content ranged from 18 to 34% was determined for 145 accessions of naked barley. This range is considered sufficiently broad to allow amylose content to be further diversified through the working with more lines and breeding.