Phenolic Fingerprint of Sicilian Modern Cultivars and Durum Wheat Landraces: a Tool to Assess Biodiversity

Durum wheat landraces have been recognized to have different contents in health-promoting phytochemicals. These health benefits have been mainly attributed to the presence of phenolic acids and flavonoids existing in this matrix both as soluble free compounds and insoluble bound forms. Sicily is one of the few areas of Southern Europe where it is still possible to find landraces of durum wheat, no longer cropped because of the commercial spread of new high-yielding varieties. This study aimed to determine the phenolic profile and content of 10 wheat landraces and three genetically improved cultivars to develop an analytical tool for cultivar screening and traceability. Hydroalcoholic extracts from wheat grains were analyzed by means of HPLC with a diode-array detector and HPLC electrospray ionization MS, revealing 13 metabolites belonging mainly to the classes of hydroxycinnamic acids and flavones C-glycosides. The quantitative pattern of the 13 phenolic markers, analyzed by applying stepwise linear discriminant analysis, allowed the discrimination between the two groups under study, namely, modern cultivars and durum wheat landraces. Furthermore, all 13 durum wheat varieties were perfectly discriminated in this statistical model, confirming a specific and genotype-dependent pattern of phenolics concentration.