Division of Plant Breeding Methodology

Sinapine (Christian Möllers)

Rapeseed protein is so far not being used in human nutrition due to the presence of undesirable compounds. In addition to glucosinolates and condensed tannins of the black seed coat, phenolic acid esters are considered as a principal antinutritive factor in canola seeds. Their concentration has been reported to be about 30 times higher than in soybean. The predominant phenolic compounds in seeds of oilseed rape are sinapate esters with sinapoylcholine (sinapine) being the most prominent one, followed by sinapoylglucose. Minor contents are reported for sinapate and other sinapate esters. They make up 1 to 2% of the seed dry matter and contribute to the bitter taste, astringency and dark colour of rapeseed products. Being oxidized during seed-oil processing, sinapate esters may form complexes with proteins, thus lowering the digestibility of rapeseed meal. The aim of ongoing research activity is to reduce the sinapate ester content of oilseed rape and to develop analytical methods suitable for efficient quality screening in breeding programmes.

Total content of phenolic acids (mg/100g) of the oil extracted meal of some oil crops (from Shahidi und Naczk 1992))

  • Soybean 23.4
  • Cotton 56.7
  • Groundnut 63.6
  • Oilseed rape 639.9



  • Hüsken, A., A. Baumert, C. Milkowski, H.C. Becker, D. Strack, and C. Möllers, 2005: Resveratrol glucoside (Piceid) synthesis in seeds of transgenic oilseed rape (Brassica napus L.). Theor. Appl. Genet. 111, 1553-1562.
  • Hüsken, A., A. Baumert, D. Strack, H.C. Becker, C. Möllers, and C. Milkowski, 2005: Reduction of sinapate ester content in transgenic oilseed rape (Brassica napus) by dsRNAi-based suppression of BnSGT1 gene expression. Molecular Breeding 16,127-138.
  • Zum Felde, T. , H.C. Becker and C. Möllers, 2006: Genotype x environment interactions, heritability, and trait correlations of sinapate ester content in winter rapeseed (Brassica napus L.). Crop Sci. 46, 2195-2199.
  • Zum Felde, T. , A. Baumert, D. Strack, H.C. Becker and C. Möllers, 2007: Genetic variation for sinapate ester content in winter rapeseed (Brassica napus L.) and development of NIRS calibration equations. Plant Breed. 126, 291—296.