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VARIETAL CHANGES IN NUTRITIONAL COMPOSITION OF WHEAT KERNEL (TRITICUM AESTIVUM L.) CAUSED BY KHAPRA BEETLE INFESTATION

MUHAMMAD SHOAIB AHMEDANI¹_, M.I. HAQUE^*2, SYED NADEEM AFZAL², M. ASLAM¹ AND S. NAZ³

Abstract: Wheat and other stored products are vulnerable to attack of Khapra beetle, which deteriorates quality of the infested commodities, depletes nutrition value and makes them unfit for human consumption. The present investigations revealed radical changes in nutritional composition of the grains of different wheat varieties when subjected to artificial infestation with 10 pairs of Trogoderma granarium larvae for six months. Maximum changes in protein, carbohydrate, fat, fiber and ash contents were observed in wheat variety BWP-97, whereas minimum changes were recorded in case of Wafaq-2001. Although protein, fat, fiber and ash contents increased with the increase in infestation level, yet the increase was just a percent increase due to depletion of carbohydrate and loss in total weight. Factually these variables decreased with the increase in infestation level.

¹Department of Entomology, PMAS-Arid Agriculture University, Rawalpindi, Pakistan

²Department of Plant Pathology, PMAS-Arid Agriculture University, Rawalpindi, Pakistan

³Department of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam, University, Islamabad Pakistan

Corresponding author: email: irfhaque@gmail.com; Tel: +92-(51) 9290239-9262243; Fax:+92 (51) 9290160