Cereal Chem 72:21-24  |  VIEW ARTICLE

Oat Tocols: Concentration and Stability in Oat Products and Distribution Within the Kernel.

D. M. Peterson. Copyright 1995 by the American Association of Cereal Chemists, Inc. 

To determine the stability of tocols (vitamin E) in oat products under various storage conditions, several oat products were stored in jars at -24 C or in jars or envelopes at room temperature for up to seven months. At approximately monthly intervals, products were ground and tocols were extracted with methanol and analyzed by high-performance liquid chromatography. Tocols were stable for seven months in all products in jars at -24 C. At room temperature, all tocols degraded in all processed products, but were stable in undried groats. Tocols degraded faster in envelopes than in jars at room temperature, indicating that air may be involved in the degradation process. alpha-Tocopherol and alpha-tocotrienol decreased faster than the other homologues during room temperature storage in envelopes, indicating differential stabilities. Analysis of hand-dissected fractions indicated that the germ was the location for most of the alpha- and gamma- tocopherol. Tocotrienols were concentrated in the endosperm and absent from the germ.