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Episode transcription:
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Drew Lyon: Hello, welcome to the WSU Wheat Beat podcast. I’m your host, Drew Lyon, and I want to thank you for joining me as we explore the world of small grains production and research at Washington State University. In each episode, I speak with researchers from WSU and the USDA-ARS to provide you with insights into the latest research on wheat and barley production.
If you enjoy the WSU Wheat Beat podcast, do us a favor and subscribe on iTunes or your favorite podcast app and leave us a review so others can find the show too.
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My guest today is Dr. Jayne Bock. Jayne is the technical director at the Wheat Marketing Center in Portland, Oregon. Her research covers topics including wheat and flour quality, dough rheology, gluten structure function, and the influence of bran on product structure and quality in whole grain products. She has worked extensively with wheat breeders, agronomists, producers, millers, and food processors on collaborative projects in the precompetitive space. Her focus is on the interface of academia and industry to find solutions for emerging issues across the market value chain.
Hello, Jayne.
Dr. Jayne Bock: Hello, Drew.
Drew Lyon: So, to get started here today, why don’t you tell us a little bit about the Wheat Marketing Center and its role in the wheat industry?
Dr. Jayne Bock: Of course. We like to joke that we are one of the most well-kept secrets in the wheat industry, but the Wheat Marketing Center is a nonprofit research and education organization located in Portland, Oregon, and our role in the industry is to act as that technical communication bridge between U.S. wheat growers and U.S. wheat customers or end users.
So, we’re there to help with, for example, technical training for U.S. wheat customers, helping them improve their end-product quality, helping them understand how to get the most out of the U.S. wheat their purchasing. We work with grower workshops focused on the importance of growers growing quality wheat, along with other public research, crop quality testing, things of that nature. So, we’re really there at the technical crossroads to help link all of the wheat value market chain across the U.S. wheat industry.
Drew Lyon: Okay. I know the Washington Grain Commission does an annual trip to kind of show how grain moves from eastern Washington to Portland and then out. And I think one of the stops is the Wheat Marketing Center. I went on that tour one time and I’d encourage anybody who has the opportunity to do it, because it’s a very interesting tour of that whole system. But, your center is very interesting to observe all the different things you do to work and help market wheat around the world.
Dr. Jayne Bock: Thank you. We like to think so.
Drew Lyon: So, today we’re going to talk a little bit about an FFAR project–a funded project between USDA and universities and businesses to develop a new test for falling numbers. To kind of set that up, maybe you can tell us a little bit about the purpose of the falling number test and how it’s used in the grain industry?
Dr. Jayne Bock: Of course. So, the falling number test is really a test to determine the soundness of grain entering the market. It’s really designed to tell us if the presence of preharvest sprouting is there or not. So, when we run that test, we’re ultimately looking to determine if that grain is sound and if it meets the contract specifications that the buyer and the seller have put together.
Drew Lyon: Okay. And what effect does this pre-harvest sprouted wheat have on baking outcomes?
Dr. Jayne Bock: Preharvest sprout can have a very detrimental impact on baking outcomes. And that’s regardless of wheat class. So, if we’re talking about hard wheats and if we use bread as kind of the classic example product, when you have sprouted wheat and as it starts to become more severely sprouted, we do start to see things like smaller loaves. Those loaves are starting to collapse when they come out of the oven, so they don’t really hold their structure or their shape. When you cut those loaves open, they’re fairly gummy inside. They might not look like they’re fully baked, even if they are.
When we talk about soft wheats, and we use a classic product example like sponge cakes, a lot of the same things still apply. You’re losing cake volume. That texture is really gummy inside. And we also start to see additional browning on the outside of the product, so it may look like we’ve over baked the product even though we haven’t changed any of our oven settings. And so really, you end up with a product that you can’t really sell out in the market. We just really can’t bake with sprouted grain.
Drew Lyon: Okay. So, when we talk about the falling number test being an indirect test for preharvest sprouting, what does that mean?
Dr. Jayne Bock: So, the thing to remember about the falling number test is that this test was initially developed in the 1940s and the 1950s and we didn’t really have good direct test methods back then for directly detecting the presence of, in this case, alpha amylase. Alpha amylase is the enzyme that is released during sprouting that we’re most concerned about.
So, this test, the falling number test, what it does is when we add water to the flour and we heat it up–when you think of adding flour to make a gravy, that flour should naturally thicken in the presence of heat and water, right? When we have a sprouted sample, think about throwing that flour into the gravy and you keep throwing flour in and throwing flour in and you can’t get any thickening action. And that’s because the alpha amylase enzyme is breaking down the starch.
So, what this test is measuring is if the starch is being broken down or not. It doesn’t really tell us exactly how much amylase is there. It just tells us that the starch is being broken down, therefore amylase must be present, and we can’t ultimately bake with this sample. It must be sprouted.
Drew Lyon: Okay. And so, this new test that is being looked at–the quick scan test–how is it different from the traditional falling numbers test?
Dr. Jayne Bock: The quick scan test is different because it is attempting to directly measure the presence of alpha amylase. So, yes, [it] will not only confirm that alpha amylase is present, but [it] will also confirm roughly how much is there as well. So, you can start to more objectively quantify how severely sprouted the grain is. And that’s something that we just can’t do with the current falling number test. We can’t directly measure how much amylase is there, just the effect that it has on the starch.
Drew Lyon: Okay. And have you been using this quick scan test there at the Wheat Marketing Center and comparing it to the traditional falling numbers test?
Dr. Jayne Bock: Yes, we have. So, we work with U.S. Wheat Associates annually to put together the crop quality report, specifically focusing on the soft white wheat grown in the Pacific Northwest. We also do testing for the hard wheats grown in the Pacific Northwest as well. But we ran–we had the opportunity to run the quick scan side by side with our falling number test for over 600 individual grain samples that we received as part of this crop quality survey. And what we found was that the quick scan did align quite nicely with our falling number results.
Drew Lyon: Okay. And my understanding is it’s also, as the name implies, a quicker procedure. Were you able to see how many more samples you could do in the time it takes you to do a traditional falling numbers test?
Dr. Jayne Bock: So, the overall amount of time it takes to get through a complete test cycle is roughly the same between the falling number and the quick scan. But what’s different is that we can run six samples at a time with a quick scan versus two samples at a time with the falling number. So, we were able to move through those samples much more quickly with the quick scan, just being able to run more of them at one time.
Drew Lyon: Okay. So, in your case, about three times more quickly. And, that is one of the interests out there in the field is to try to get these tests run really quickly so you can, I guess, segregate the wheat at the point of receiving, so if you have some low falling numbers, you know not to bin it with some good wheat. So, hopefully that will help.
Something that’s been around in the industry since the 40s or 50s. Let me do the math here–that’s what 60, 80, 70, 80 years? It’s kind of hard for people to change their gear. Do you see any barriers to the adoption of this quick test in the face of technology that’s been around so long?
Dr. Jayne Bock: I do see some challenges, mainly because the grain industry has been around and using some of these test methods for so long. The falling number test has been commercially utilized since roughly the 1960s in Europe, and it was really heavily adopted here in the US roughly the 1990s. And the challenge there is that everybody speaks falling number now.
When we talk about the soundness of grain, it’s always relative to 300 seconds or whatever the contract specifications are. And that’s the challenge for any new test coming in is how do you make it relatable in the terms that people already understand, especially when you’re talking about contract specs that are written, you know, 300 seconds or better, for example? The quick scan has to be able to kind of make their measurement relevant to, you know, a 300-second threshold. So, that’s really kind of one of the biggest barriers to adoption is just kind of switching that mindset over from talking in 300 seconds, you know, to ultimately a different type of measurement system.
And the quick scan is doing that right now. Their values are correlated to falling number values that are easily understood. But with time, you know, you would want to get away from that.
I think the other barrier to adoption is still, like I said, the test cycle takes roughly the same amount of time right now. The difference is just you can move more samples through in one test cycle. So, as the test continues to evolve and develop, can that test time be decreased at all or improved upon in some way so that you can maybe continue to increase the throughput of that test?
Drew Lyon: Okay. So, I wonder if I could get you to prognosticate here a bit. Do you see this tool taking over the market at some point or taking over from the traditional falling numbers test? And if so, how long would you anticipate something like that to take?
Dr. Jayne Bock: I would like to think that this test will eventually take over as more industry players start to utilize it. It is a more efficient test, and it also by directly measuring the amylase content is–it’s ultimately going to be a more accurate test as well. Like I said, the challenge is just going to get people to convert that mindset.
It’s probably going to take, you know, a good 10 to 15 years before we start to see some movement in the grain industry and maybe contract specs getting written in something other than 300-second-type language. So, I’m hopeful, especially since EnviroLogix seems to be a really committed partner with this project and seems to be really committed to improving the utility of the test for, you know, the industry. So, hopefully [by] 10 to 15 years we’ll start to see the some real fruit come to bear out of this.
Drew Lyon: Okay. And as director of the Wheat Marketing Center, will you be discussing this tool with foreign buyers who might come through your unit or who with whom you interact to start educating them on this new test and how it might be used?
Dr. Jayne Bock: Yes, very much so. Right now, we’re in the middle of our grower workshop season and we’ve certainly been discussing the test with all the growers and producers that are coming through the Center. But as we start to enter the spring and the summer, we start to see more of our international customers coming into the Center for various workshops.
And this is one of the tests we’ll be talking about. Especially as I mentioned with it being a more direct measure, you know, just introducing the concepts to them, kind of introducing them to our results, running the falling number and the quick scan side by side, and our success with the test. So, hopefully it will start to, you know, penetrate the thinking of our U.S wheat customers and hopefully with time, we’ll start to see some pull from end users to see this test used over the falling number at some point.
Drew Lyon: All right. Jayne, thank you very much for being my guest today. And I wish you, a great deal of success in your role as technical director at the Wheat Marketing Center. It fulfills an important role for the wheat industry, not only in the Pacific Northwest, but I think throughout much of the country. So, thanks for your work and efforts, and thank you for taking the time to discuss the quick scan test with us today.
Dr. Jayne Bock: Thank you for inviting me. It was a pleasure to speak with you today.
Drew Lyon:
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Thanks for joining us and listening to the WSU Wheat Beat podcast. If you like what you hear don’t forget to subscribe and leave a review on iTunes or your favorite podcast app. If you have questions or topics you’d like to hear on future episodes, please email me at drew.lyon — that’s lyon@wsu.edu — (drew.lyon@wsu.edu). You can find us online at smallgrains.wsu.edu and on Facebook and Twitter [X] @WSUSmallGrains. The WSU Wheat Beat podcast is a production of CAHNRS Communications and the College of Agricultural, Human, and Natural Resource Sciences at Washington State University.
I’m Drew Lyon, we’ll see you next time.
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The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by guests of this podcast are their own and does not imply Washington State University’s endorsement.