Wisconsin Discovery Portal

Researcher's Profile

Last Name

Henson 

First Name

Cynthia 

Middle Initial

Areas of Research Expertise

* Focuses on barley and oats, with a specific interest in the improvement of malting barley
* Evaluates carbohydrate metabolism and protein degredation in malting barley
* Researches the metabolism of cereal phytochemicals
* Improves barley seed quality through molecular and functional genomic analysis of gene expression

Web site

Cynthia Henson's University Web Page 

Curriculum Vitae (CV)

 

Current/Active Funding

  • American Malting Barley Association, Inc., 1994-2021, Improved Starch Hydrolysis Using Barley Alpha-Glucosidases

Issued Patent(s)

  • 6,849,439 - Modified barley alpha-glucosidase, granted Feb 2005. 
 
 

USPTO Published Applications

Recent Publication(s)

  • "Phenotypic Variation for Diastric Power, beta-Amylase Activity, and beta-Amylase Thermostability vs. Allelic Variation at the Bmy1 locus in a Sample of North American Barley Germplasm"

Filichkin TP, Vinje MA, Budde AD, Corey AE, Duke SH, et al., Crop Science 50(3): 826-834 May-Jun 2010.  This research shows the importance of having complete allele sequences and knowledge of functional polymorphisms in target genes before using marker-assisted selection. 

  • "Utilization of Different Bmy1 Intron III Alleles for Predicting beta-Amylase Activity and Thermostability in Wild and Cultivated Barley"

Vinje MA, Duke SH, Henson CA, Plant Molecular Biology Reporter 28(3): 491-501 Sept 2010.  Significantly different activities were found in genotypes with any of these three alleles when calculated on a FW basis yet only in those with the Bmy1.c allele when calculated on a protein basis.

  • "A comparison of barley malt osmolyte concentrations and standard malt quality measurements as indicators of barley malt amylolytic enzyme activities"

Duke SH, Henson CA, Journal of the American Society of Brewing Chemists 67 (4): 206-216 2009. This study was conducted to test the hypothesis that barley malt osmolyle concentration (OC) would correlate better with malt alpha-amylase, beta-amylase, and limit dextrinase activities than do the standard malt quality measurements (malt extract, diastatic power [DP], alpha-amylase activity as measured by the ASBC method, soluble/total protein [S/F], and beta-glucan concentration).

  • "A Comparison of Barley Malt Amylolytic Enzyme Activities as Indicators of Malt Sugar Concentrations"

Duke SH, Henson CA, Journal of the American Society of Brewing Chemists 67 (2): 99-111 2009. This study was conducted to test the hypothesis that barley malt alpha-amylase activity correlates better with malt sugar concentrations than the activities of beta-amylase or limit dextrinase. Keywords: Alpha-Amylase; Beta-Amylase; Diastatic Power; Limit Dextrinase; Germinating Cereal-Grains; Fructan Exohydrolase; Starch.

  • "A comparison of barley malt quality measurements and malt sugar concentrations"

Duke SH, Henson CA, Journal of the American Society of Brewing Chemists 66 (3): 151-161 2008. This study was conducted to test two hypotheses: 1) that malt osmolyte concentration (OC) values would be better correlated with malt sugar concentrations than malt extract (ME) values and 2) that malt a-amylase activity (alpha-AA) would be better correlated with malt sugar concentrations than diastatic power (DP). Overall, malt OC correlated better with malt sugar concentrations than ME, DIP, or alpha-AA, indicating that OC best predicts starch hydrolysis during malting and a subsequent short mashing period.

  • "A comparison of standard and nonstandard measures of malt quality"

Henson CA, Duke SH, Journal of the American Society of Brewing Chemists 66 (1): 11-19 2008. The malt quality traits that distinguished the two lowest performing of the six elite malting barleys from the other malts were alpha-glucosidase, limit dextrinase, and alpha-amylase activities, which were lower in these two malts, plus the thermostabilities of alpha-amylase, beta-amylase, and limit dextrinase and wort osmolyte concentrations, which were higher in these two malts.

Recent Artistic Works

 

Collaboration

  • ARS, Cereal Crops Research Unit

Research Tools

 

Research Facilities

  • Cereal Crops Research Unit

E-mail Address

cahenson@wisc.edu 

Phone Number

(608) 262-0377 

Current University

UW - Madison 

Department

Agronomy 

Title

Associate Professor 

Other Appointments

Research Leader, Cereal Crops Research Unit

Address Line 1

Room 345 

Address Line 2

502 Walnut Street 

City

Madison 

State

WI 

Zip Code

53705 

Bachelor's Degree

 

Master's Degree

 

PhD

 

Other Degrees

 

Technologies Available for Licensing

Attachments
Created at 6/12/2007 2:07 PM  by Mindy Dawson 
Last modified at 5/13/2010 4:28 PM  by EXTWEB\alarson