Agro-resources fractionation; structural and physico-chemical basis;grinding, extraction and separation processes

Axe 1

Fractionation processes which proceed by raw matter size reduction and separation appear as a critical stepin the control of composition and properties of the obtained mill fraction and streams for food or non-foodapplications. The team is involved in the better understanding and the modelling of dry fractionation ofagro-resources, mainly applied to cereal grains and lignocellulosic material. The developed approachescombine structural and physico-chemical analyse, mechanical characterisations, and technologicalinvestigations. This multidisciplinary vision allows the researchers to investigate in a large field of process,products and applications. New processes (pre-treatments, degerming, debranning, bran fractionation...) havebeen developed in order to increase the nutritional value, sanitary level, and sustainability without alteringtechnological properties or taste, to decrease contaminants or to develop new uses for obtained fractions.

Research topics麦 Tracking the role of components during the process.麦 Characterisation of mechanical properties of planttissues in relation with the composition and structure.麦 Identification of the relationships between genetic orenvironmental factors and the fractionation behaviour.麦 Analytical tools to monitor fractionation processesmethods using physico-chemical properties.

Some results麦 Identification of specific biochemical compounds orspectral signatures (FTIR, fluorescence...) enabling theidentification and quantification of tissues in fractions.Development of rapid screening methods in industry forgrain tissue monitoring based on spectral tissueproperties.麦 Modelling the behaviour of the wheat endosperm as acohesive granular material. Study of the effect of theadherence between starch and protein, and the proteincontent as a descriptor of starch damaged level duringmilling.麦 Dissociation between hardness locus and theenvironmental factors onto the endosperm friability.麦 Demonstration of pre-treatment ability for themodification of mechanical properties of wheat tissues.麦 Effect of water content and temperature on thebreaking energy of the wheat grain outer layers.麦 Reduction of the mycotoxins level by using pearlingprocess.麦 Production of interesting nutritional fractions usingcryo-grinding coupled to electrostatic separation.

Examples of projects麦 European project HealthGrain (2005-2010)

www.healthgrain.org麦 RARE project mycotoxins (2003-2007)麦 Wheat Milling Value (2003-2011)麦 BléNNat project (2007-2010)麦 ANR Wheafi (2011-2013)麦 Project 3Bcar (2010-...) www.3bcar.fr

CooperationACADEMIC: TNO and Maastricht U., Netherlands;VTT, Finland ;USDA, Washington State U., USA; LP3, UMR 6182, Marseille ; LCVN, UMR 5587,Montpellier ; LMGC, UMR 5508, Montpellier ;Ecole des mines, Alès, LBE, INRA Narbonne,Poitiers U., UMR 6609, UR BIA, INRA Nantes,INRA Clermont …INDUSTRIAL: ARVALIS institut du végétal ;Barilla ; Chopin Technologie ; LIMAGRAIN ;Kraft Food Europe ; SD-TECH …

Contact person ; LULLIEN-PELLERIN V., valerie.lullien@supagro.inra.fr ;2 Place P. Viala 34060 Montpellier Cedex 01 France ; www.montpellier.inra.fr/umr-iate

Facilities麦 National Platform for dry agro-ressourcesfractionation麦 Micro-mechanics (DMTA, Static and dynamictesting machines).麦 Biochemistry (polysaccharides, proteins,phenolics ...)麦 Physico-chemistry and microscopy (FTIR,Raman, fluorescence, water sorption balance …)