Non-starch polysaccharide–phenolic acid complexes from native and germinated cereals and millet

Non-starch polysaccharide–phenolic acid complexes were isolated from native and germinated (96 h) cereals, such as rice, maize, wheat and millet-ragi. They were designated as water extractable (WEPs, yield: 0.60–3.56%) and water-unextractable (WUPs, yield: 7.49–37.8%) non-starch polysaccharides, which consisted mainly of arabinose, xylose and glucose in different ratios and differed in their bound phenolic acid contents (43.7–4023 μg/g). Ferulic and coumaric acids, the main bound phenolic acids, were predominantly bound (∼90%) to WUPs. The amount of ferulic acid is several-fold higher than that of coumaric acid and their contents decreased markedly upon germination.