Popping expansion tests in popcorn breeding programs

Abstract

Quality, normally expressed by the relation volume of popcorn/weight of grains (volume expansion), is an important characteristic in popcorn breeding. Different systems of assessing popcorn expansion should be used in individual and family selections, since they are common to consumers. The purpose of this work was to evaluate two systems for popping expansion determination in breeding programs. The first was a hot air popcorn pumper and the second was a microwave oven. For the first one an experiment was installed in a completely randomized design, with three treatments and nine levels of kernel weight, and five replications. For the second one, aiming to define an alternative packaging, an experiment was installed also in a completely randomized design, following a factorial scheme, with three replications, involving two times and five packagings. Another experiment was achieved to verify the microwave oven quality for volume expansion determination with a little kernel quantity and the best time to be used. The hot air popcorn pumper is an efficient system, in which 10 g of kernel can be used to evaluate plants and up to 90 g of kernel can be used to evaluate families in the experiments. The microwave oven is equivalent to the hot air popcorn pumper. Kraft paper bags can be used in the microwave oven. For plant evaluation 10 g of kernel with 140 seconds are recommended. To evaluate progenies 30 g to 90 g of kernel with 220 seconds can be used.