Research Project: Pulse Crop Health Initiative

Location: Sugarbeet and Potato Research

2023 Annual Report

Objectives
Coordinate the implementation of the pulse health initiative for expanded pulse crops research in the areas of health and nutrition, functionality, sustainability, and global food security. Research should be coordinated with interested ARS, state, and industry cooperators, and administered through non-assisted cooperative agreements. Planning workshops and annual meetings involving interested parties will be organized throughout the funding period.

Approach
Research will be conducted cooperatively to address the following research areas: Human Health and Chronic Disease Prevention; Functionality Traits and Food Security; and Sustainability of Pulse Production Systems. Targeted projects will focus on dry bean, dry pea, chickpea, or lentil research (or a combination of pulse crops) in the following priority areas: (1) Determine the role of pulse food consumption in a healthy diet with an emphasis on the biological mechanisms and impact on key health endpoints (e.g., glycemic control, cardiovascular risk factors, obesity/overweight, metabolic syndrome, inflammation, or microbiome composition); (2) Conduct well-designed and adequately controlled studies in humans that provide definitive data regarding the nutritional/health benefits of pulses as a component of a healthy diet; (3) Determine dietary consumption patterns of pulse foods and pulse food ingredients among U.S. consumers and the barriers and facilitators to pulse consumption; (4) Determine the role of dietary fiber, oligosaccharides, and other plant prebiotics from pulse crops in altering the composition and promoting beneficial attributes of a healthy gut microbiome; (5) Identify biomarkers of intake for various pulses; (6) Determine whether/how processing changes the health benefits or energy value of pulse foods consumed as part of a healthy diet; (7) Optimize processing conditions and formulations to improve the acceptability, flavor, nutritional value, or health attributes of foods made with pulses; (8) Develop high-throughput functionality measures that can be used by breeders and industry to assess functional characteristics of novel germplasm or current varieties; (9) Evaluate functional properties of protein and other pulse fractions/ingredients and optimize their use in food applications; (10) Determine the variability in chemical/nutritional composition of pulse crops and determine factors (agronomic, genetic or environmental) that influence that variation; (11) Determine factors (genetic or environmental) affecting the functional properties of pulse foods as ingredients in different food applications; (12) Develop pulse varieties with improved nutritional or functional attributes, combined with enhanced agronomic traits, and disease and pest resistance; (13) Assess the water footprint and demonstrate the value of improved water use efficiency in pulse-small grain cropping systems (e.g., field studies; life-cycle analyses); (14) Assess the carbon footprint and demonstrate the value of pulse cropping systems on the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions; (15) Develop improved pulse varieties that fix more nitrogen and identify enhanced plant-rhizobia interactions that yield superior nitrogen fixing capacity and leave greater residual nitrogen in soil; (16) Develop agronomic strategies to improve soil health through the incorporation of pulses in a cropping system rotation; (17) Assess the impact of incorporating pulses and expanding their use in the U.S. diet on sustainability outcomes.

Progress Report
This report documents progress for cooperative research performed as part of the Pulse Crop Health Initiative and involves researchers at several U.S. universities and USDA-ARS locations, in cooperation with USDA-ARS in Fargo, North Dakota. Over the life of this project, we have initiated a total of 82 cooperative projects, of which 28 have been completed. Projects were established through non-assistance cooperative agreements with university faculty or through temporary funds transfers to ARS scientists at other locations. There will be 54 continuing projects that will be carried into the next project cycle. All studies throughout the life of the project have focused on the following priority areas: (1) the role of pulse consumption in human health improvement & chronic disease prevention, (2) understanding functionality traits of pulse ingredients for use in human food products, (3) breeding pulse crops for nutritional quality and food security, or (4) sustainability benefits of including pulse crops in various production systems. Research covered all target pulse crops, including peas, lentils, chickpeas, dry beans, and cowpeas. Each year, research plans-of-work were requested for the fiscal year funding cycle. Proposals were reviewed and ranked by one of three scientific review panels focused on human health, breeding and sustainability, or food technology. The Initiative Steering Committee met and made recommendations on which projects to fund, with attention given to the research priority areas of Breeding, Sustainability, Food Technology, and Human Health.

Accomplishments

Review Publications
Atanda, S.A., Steffes, J., Lan, Y., Al Bari, M., Kim, J., Morales, M., Johnson, J., Saludares, R.A., Worral, H., Piche, L., Ross, A., Grusak, M.A., Coyne, C.J., McGee, R.J., Rao, J., Bandillo, N. 2022. Multi-trait genomic prediction improves selection accuracy for enhancing seed mineral concentrations in pea (Pisum sativum L.). The Plant Genome. 2022. Article e20260. https://doi.org/10.1002/tpg2.20260.
Shen, Y., Wu, X., Li, Y. 2022. Modulating molecular interactions in pea protein to improve its functional properties. Food Hydrocolloids. 8. Article 100313. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jafr.2022.100313.
Rajpurohit, B., Li, Y. 2023. Overview on pulse proteins for future foods: ingredient development and novel applications. Future Foods. 3(4):340-356. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jfutfo.2023.03.005.
Rivera, J., Siliveru, K., Li, Y. 2022. A comprehensive review on pulse protein fractionation and extraction: processes, functionality, and food applications. Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition. https://doi.org/10.1080/10408398.2022.2139223.
Paff, A., Cockburn, D.W. 2023. Evaluating the efficacy of non-thermal microbial load reduction treatments of heat labile food components for in vitro fermentation experiments. PLOS ONE. 18(3). Article e0283287. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0283287.
Hong, S., Shen, Y., Li, Y. 2022. Physicochemical and functional properties of texturized vegetable proteins and cooked patty textures: Comprehensive characterization and correlation analysis. Foods. 11(17). Article 2619. https://doi.org/10.3390/foods11172619.
Rideout, T.C., Andreani, G.A., Pembroke, J., Choudhary, D., Browne, R.W., Mahmood, S., Patel, M.S. 2023. Maternal pea protein intake provides sex-specific protection against dyslipidemia in offspring from obese pregnancies. Nutrients. 15(4). Article 867. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu15040867.
Kadyan, S., Park, G., Singh, P., Arjmandi, B., Nagpal, R. 2023. Prebiotic mechanisms of resistant starches from dietary beans and pulses on gut microbiome and metabolic health in a humanized murine model of aging. Frontiers in Nutrition. 10. Article 1106463. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnut.2023.1106463.
Kadyan, S., Park, G., Wang, B., Signh, P., Arjmandi, B., Nagpal, R. 2023. Resistant starches from dietary pulses modulate the gut metabolome in association with microbiome in a humanized murine model of ageing. Scientific Reports. 13. Article 10566. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-37036-w.