Nutritious Seeds in Health and Disease Prevention

Nutritious Seeds in Health and Disease Prevention.

- Parul Thapar

INTRODUCTION

A seed is a small embryonic plant that is enclosed in a covering called seed coat and contains the stored food in the form of carbohydrates like glucose, sucrose, starch, etc. The seed consist of mainly three parts i.e embryo, endosperm and testa. The endosperm is a collection of stored food that the young plant uses to grow. The embryo is called ‘baby’ of the seed which develops into a new plant while testa is the outermost layer of the seed which protects the endosperm and embryo from damage through outer environmental factors. In plants, the seeds are of two types- naked seeds which are present in gymnosperms like pine, cycas, etc. that do not develop into flowering plants. On the other hand, seeds found enclosed within the fruit develop on flowering plants called angiosperms. Some of these seeds are edible and some are not edible but give rise to new plants when grow in the soil. The edible seeds include seeds in dry fruits like-almonds, cashew nuts, walnuts, etc.; vegetable seeds likepears, beans etc.; fruit seeds likepomegranate, melon etc.; cereals like wheat, rice, pulses, etc. (Fig. 1).

NUTRITIOUS SEEDS

The edible seeds contain nutrients like vitamins, minerals, carbohydrates, antioxidants that help in the prevention of certain infectious diseases and can be regarded as nutritious seeds. The various seeds that may help in the prevention of diseases are mentioned below: