• Journal of the Korean Society of Food Science and Nutrition
• /
• v.28 no.6
• /
• pp.1187-1190
• /
• 1999

Lotus seed(Nelumbo nucifera Gaertner), known as traditional medicine as an antifebrile, antipsychotic, and cantihypertensive agent, was analyzed the chemical composition of lipid and protein. The seed com posed of 12.2% moisture, 2.3% crude lipid, 19.5% crude protein, 61.3% carbohydrate, 2.1% crude fibre, and 4.1% ash. The lipid showed iodine value of 97.9 that is lower than that of soybean oil and sesame oil, and similar to peanut oil and cotton seed oil. The fatty acid composition of the oil were the highest in content of linoleic acid which occupied 58.3% and saturated vs unsaturated fatty acid was 20.9:79.1. Especially behenic acid content, 6.9%, was higher than other plant oils. Sixteen amino acids were detected in the protein from the seed and glutamic acid content was the highest as 4.5% in dehulled kernel. The portion of essential amino acid was 31.1%.