Influence of the germination stage on processability in aqueous phase of Chia seeds for the release of oil bodies

Abstract: An aqueous integrated process has been developed for several years for high robustness and versatility in the release of oil bodies (OB) from oilseeds. It is designed as an eco-compatible biorefinery within the framework of the circular economy for the release of OB in emulsified form. Developed on rapeseed as a model, this process has evolved to adapt to the diversity of oilseeds and particularly to mucilage-rich seeds such as flax, camelina or chia.
The presented work, carried out during projects gathering several French laboratories, aims at observing the influence of the demucilagination on the germination of chia seeds and conversely the effect of this germination on their processability for OB release. For that purpose, we opted for a simplified and reproducible procedure of germination and studied various stages of germination (0h/1h/24h/48h).
Degumming, if it remains essential for seeds processability in water, does not prevent the germination and can be applied before or after this one without consequences on fractionation (centrifugal separation of concentrates after destructuration in water). The more advanced the germination stage, the more the reserve lipids are mobilized and used for the development of the future plant: total lipid content decreases, proportion of triglycerides decreases in favor of the appearance of greater proportions of partial glycerides and free fatty acids. The release of OBs remains conclusive whatever the germination stage, demonstrating the robustness of the process. However, lipids, especially saturated chains, become more distributed in the pellet, decreasing the yield of released OBs in the upper emulsified phase.
The objective is also to couple this work with metabolomic, lipidomic and proteomic studies to determine the mechanisms that take place in the oil seed during its germination. The interest is to be able to discover stages of germination allowing enrichment in certain molecules of interest.