1974 Volume 21 Issue 1 Pages 19-24
Hydrogen peroxide remaining in peanuts and soybeans inflated with hydrogen peroxide treatment, and effect of the seeds on rats were tested.
Hydrogen peroxide was not detected in seeds immersed in the solution several times longer than the periods of inflation for each species. A small quantity of hydrogen peroxide, which decomposed after standing for one half to one hour, was detected on the surface of the seeds, when they were treated excessively with the solution.
The effect of the inflated seeds on rats was examined through twenty-eight weeks, forty percent of the diet consisting of the treated peanuts or soybeans. At the end of the feeding, the weight gain, the organ weight, and the anatomic observation on the rats of the test groups were compared with those of the controls, whose diet included forty percent of untreated seeds. In the group, fed with soybeans, there was no significant difference between the test rats and the controls, except a reduction of testicles weight of the former. In the group fed with peanuts, no significant difference was observed, except for a slight decrease of kidney weight of the test rats.
