Figure 1.

The effect of sample handling and storage on the concentrations of sugar, starch and total NSC for three plant materials. Samples were freeze-dried, microwaved prior to oven drying or placed in a drying oven without microwaving, but not stored prior to drying (left panels). A comparison was performed of samples that were either microwaved or not microwaved, then stored at 4 or 20 °C for 8 h before oven drying (right panels). Significant differences among treatments for each sample material in each panel are shown with letters (P < 0.05). All data shown here were measured with the phenol-sulfuric acid method, and means of three replicates are shown for each bar. Error bars are one standard deviation.