chemical composition of cereals
The principal carbohydrate of all cereals is starch, representing 56 percent (oats) to 80 percent (maize) of the grain dry matter (Eliasson and Larsson 1993). Cereal starches are similar in composition, having 74-79 percent amylopectin, 25-30 percent amylose, and 1 percent lipids.he lipid content of maize ranges between 0.4 percent and 17 percent, most of which are triacylglycerides (Eliasson and Larsson 1993). Different cultivars of a given type of cereal exhibit compositional variability. The chemical components of cereals are not uniformly distributed in the grain (Table 3).