Cereal Chem 59:323 - 327.  |  VIEW ARTICLE
A Comparison of the Amino Acid Composition of Two Commercial Oat Groats.

C. G. Zarkadas, H. W. Hulan, and F. G. Proudfoot. Copyright 1982 by the American Association of Cereal Chemists, Inc. 

The crude protein content of commercially available dehulled oats averaged 14.97% for cv. Oxford, grown in eastern Canada and 13.30% for cv. Sentinel, grown in western Canada. Although the total lipid content (6.57%) and metabolizable energy (17.74 MJ/kg db) of western oat groats differs considerably from eastern grown oat groats (3.7%, 16.91 MJ/kg db), their crude fiber contents did not differ significantly and ranged from 3.4 to 3.7% of the elemental composition. Both commercial oat groats contained good quality protein, with an amino acid profile superior to that of other cereals and an excellent balance of essential amino acids limited only in lysine. The values obtained for methionine and cystine far exceeded those previously reported for other oat varieties, and the present analyses yielded values 10-15% higher for the sum of lysine, threonine, and methionine. Excellent recovery of tryptophan in oat groat proteins was achieved for the first time. 4-Hydroxyproline, previously thought to be confined almost exclusively to the collagens and elastin of vertebrates and invertebrates, was also found in both commercial sources of oat groats at 0.22 and 0.14 g/kg, respectively.