- This event has passed.
Characterising the potential of the green plum (Buchanania obovata) as a native Australian fruit – HDR seminar
21 July 2021 @ 1:00 pm - 2:00 pm
cThesis Review Seminar
Wednesday, 21st July 2021, 1:00 – 2:00 pm
Room 10.2.504, Block 10, Health and Food Science Precinct, 39 Kessels Rd, Coopers Plains
Zoom link: https://uqz.zoom.us/j/86842487774
Presented by: Selina Fyfe, Centre for Nutrition and Food Science
Advisory team: Prof Yasmina Sultanbawa, A/Prof Heather Smyth and A/Prof Horst Joachim Schirra
About this seminar
The green plum (Buchanania obovata) is an Australian native fruit that grows in the northern parts of the Northern Territory and Western Australia that is eaten by Australian Indigenous people and has had very little study by western food science. The purpose of this project was to understand the green plum better as a food and a fruit. This work collates the framework for responsible research with Australian native plant foods. It uses descriptive analysis to articulate the sensory attributes of the fruit as whole or pieces of fruit, as a puree and as an ingredient (freeze-dried powder) in semolina and yoghurt, which described the green plums flavour as sweet, tart and stewed apple. It provides a nutrition profile of ripe fruit and does further folate analysis by stable isotope dilution assay analysed on a Liquid Chromatograph Mass Spectrometer show the ripe green plums are a valuable source of folate, containing between 82.4 ± 5.52 and 149.4 ± 10.68 µg/100g FW as pteroylmonoglutamic acid equivalents. This thesis includes a major study of green plums as they develop through maturity stages and ripening, from four geographical locations in the Northern Territory and from two harvest years. This includes studies analysing physical properties, magnetic resonance imaging, gas analysis and folate vitamers. Fruit extracts were analysed with non-targeted Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) based metabolomics at 900 MHz and with non-targeted 12 Tesla Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry (FT-ICR-MS). Metabolomics gave identifications or annotated identifications of over 350 metabolites with semi-quantification. It shows differences occur through maturation, ripening and between locations.