Substantial efforts have been made in incorporating tannin-rich forages into grassland-based livestock production systems. However, the structural and functional diversity of tannins in different species limits their potential use at the field scale. We conducted a greenhouse experiment with 17 cultivars from 8 forage species and their cultivars. Ultraperformance liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry was used to analyze their polyphenolic profile and proanthocyanidin (PA) structural features in leaves. Our results highlight large inter- and intraspecies variability of plants in terms of polyphenol and tannin concentrations in the leaves. A concomitant and significant variation was also registered in the structural features of PA-rich forages such as the mean degree of polymerization and prodelphinidin percentage. The concentration of PA also varied within plant organs; the highest concentration was in flowers, but leaves had the highest contribution to harvestable PA biomass. Our research highlights that identifying these variations helps in identifying the representativeness of bioactivity and provides the basis for targeted breeding programs.

中文翻译：

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八种温带牧草中多酚和原花青素的种间和种内变异表明它们有可能被用作营养品

在将富含单宁的草料纳入以草原为基础的畜牧生产系统方面已经做出了大量努力。然而，不同物种单宁的结构和功能多样性限制了它们在田间规模的潜在用途。我们对来自 8 个牧草品种及其栽培品种的 17 个栽培品种进行了温室试验。超高效液相色谱串联质谱用于分析其叶片中的多酚谱和原花青素 (PA) 结构特征。我们的结果突出了植物在叶子中多酚和单宁浓度方面的巨大种间和种内变异。富含 PA 的牧草的结构特征也出现了伴随的显着变化，例如平均聚合度和原飞燕草素百分比。PA的浓度在植物器官内也有所不同。花中浓度最高，但叶子对可收获 PA 生物量的贡献最大。我们的研究强调，识别这些变异有助于识别生物活性的代表性，并为有针对性的育种计划提供基础。