Cereal Chem 65:312-315   |  VIEW ARTICLE

Wheat Hardness: A Microscopic Classification of Individual Grains.

P. J. Mattern. Copyright 1988 by the American Association of Cereal Chemists, Inc. 

Wheat grains placed lengthwise, crease up, on a self-adhesive tape were crushed with corrugated rollers spaced at 1.08 mm. Crushed grains were viewed with a dissecting microscope at a magnification of 15x. A hardness index was established using a rating from 1 to 10 (soft to hard). A set of standardizing photographs and a video tape were prepared as a training aid for the method. The microscopic hardness evaluation of single grains provides an inexpensive, accurate evaluation of wheat samples to determine heterogeneity of varieties, environmental influence on hardness, and the percentage mixture of soft and hard wheats. Microscopic data gave coefficients of correlation of -0.94 and -0.95 with particle size index and near- infrared reflectance, respectively.