Sorghum (Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench) is the fifth important cereal crop after wheat (Triticum aestivum L.), maize (Zea mays L.), rice (Oryza sativa L.), and barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) in the world. It is cultivated in about 46 million ha with a total production of 62 million t (FAO 1998). Asia and Africa account 86% of the total area under sorghum, but their contribution towards total product...

Cereal Chem. 83(1):108–113 The single kernel characterization system (SKCS) has been widely used in the wheat industry, and SKCS parameters have been linked to end-use quality in wheat. The SKCS has promise as a tool for evaluating sorghum grain quality. However, the SKCS was designed to analyze wheat, which has a different kernel structure from sorghum. To gain a better understanding of the me...

Sorghum bicolor is an ancient plant that has been cultivated in North-eastern Africa for over 5000 years [1]. This is a cane like grass, up to 6 meters tall with large branched clusters of grains. The individual grains are around 3-4 mm in diameter and vary in colour from white, red, brown, yellow, purple, to black. The leaves resemble those of maize and grow rapidly. Sorghum grains of differen...

Sorghum grain is an important ingredient in poultry diets. The TMEn content of sorghum grain is a measure of its quality. As for the other feed ingredients, the biological procedure used to determine the TMEn value of sorghum grain is costly and time consuming. Therefore, it is necessary to find an alternative method to accurately estimate the TMEn content. In this study, 2 methods of regressio...

Sorghum bicolor is an ancient plant that has been cultivated in North-eastern Africa for over 5000 years [1]. This is a cane like grass, up to 6 meters tall with large branched clusters of grains. The individual grains are around 3-4 mm in diameter and vary in colour from white, red, brown, yellow, purple, to black. The leaves resemble those of maize and grow rapidly. Sorghum grains of differen...

The mechanisms by which reconstitution increases rumen degradation of grain sorghum and relevant studies that have measured effects of reconstitution on growth performance by finishing cattle were reviewed. The growth performance data summarized indicate that reconstitution of sorghum improved feed efficiency by 15% when compared to dry-rolled sorghum with a 7.6% increase in rate of gain. Indiv...

Waterfowl frequently acquire high-energy agricultural seeds in harvested and unharvested croplands during migration and winter. Estimates of agricultural seed biomass in harvested and unharvested corn, soybean, and grain sorghum fields do not exist or are outdated for the southeastern United States. Therefore, we estimated seed biomass in 105 harvested and 59 unharvested corn, soybean, and grai...

Carbohydrates stored in vegetative organs, particularly stems, of grasses are a very important source of energy. We examined carbohydrate accumulation in adult sorghum and maize hybrids with distinct phenology and different end uses (grain, silage, sucrose or sweetness in stalk juice, and biomass). Remarkable variation was observed for non-structural carbohydrates and structural polysaccharides...

Cereal Chern. 75(1):100-104 Correlations among grain sorghum quality factors (proximate composition, physical properties, and water absorption properties) were evaluated. Samples of 46 commercial hybrids (24 and 22 from crop years 1993 and 1994) were analyzed for starch, protein, crude free fat, test weight, absolute density, 1,000 kernel weight, percent kernel abraded, water absorption index, ...

BACKGROUND Sorghum types suitable for brewing and bioethanol production are required. The effect of sorghum type (white non-tannin versus white type II tannin) on free amino nitrogen (FAN) production from sorghum grain and malt using exogenous protease enzymes was investigated over extended incubation at moderate temperature (45 °C). RESULTS With grain in the absence of exogenous proteases, w...