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Nutrient composition and anti-nutritional factors in a local cultivar of Moringa oleifera (Lam) flowers

I.O.Igwilo, F.C.Ezeonu, S.C.Udedi, K.I.Ubaoji, N.A.Ozumba, H.A.Ogbunugafor

The methods of Association of Analytical Chemists were used for the proximate analysis of Moringa oleifera (Lam) flower and the amino acid content determined using Technicon Sequential Multi-Sample amino acid analyzer (TSM). The flowers contain 9.44 ± 3.08fat; 25.99 ± 0.07proteins; 50.57 carbohydrates; 3.57 ± 0.12 ash; 10.43 ± 0.58 moisture and 89.57 ± 0.58drymatter. The total energy value of the flower is 391.20 kcal/100g. The flowers contain ascorbic acid (459.21mg/100g) and pyridoxine (7.69mg/100g), but lack niacin, riboflavin and thiamine.Calcium(2.32mg/ 100g), Potassium(3.02mg/100g) and Sodium(129.03mg/100g)were found in the flowers. Tannins (60mg/100g) and oxalates (51.23mg/100g) were present at higher levels, while saponins (15.20mg/100g) phytates (0.436mg/ 100g) and cyanogenic glycosides (4.31mg/100g) occurred at much lower levels. The results of analysis of variance indicated that there was no significant difference between the essential and non-essential amino acids present in the flowers since the significance value of the result was well over 0.05. Experimental studieswith rats suggest that despite the appreciably high protein (25.99%) content of the flowers, it did not support growth. Rats fed compounded meal containing 38.5%ofMoringa flower ration for 21 days presented with drastic reduction in growth rate with mean body weight declining from55.20 ± 1.60g to 39.70 ± 1.15g. The implication is that either the anti-nutritional factors interfered with normalmetabolismor that the protein content of the flower is not digestible.