The ABTS and DPPH methods are among the most popular assays of antioxidant activity determination. Attempts to adapt them to different analytes and the search for the highest values of antioxidant activity has resulted in a large variety of assay conditions to be presented in the literature, including the way the measurement is made. This makes it difficult to relate the results to real oxidation systems, and often makes it impossible to compare them. Such a comparison is limited in advance by the use of stable radicals that do not exist in nature and that react differently from those generated in food or in vivo. Therefore, it is important to introduce measures aimed at standardizing the conditions of the activity assay, including reaction time and several reaction environments suitable for testing different groups of compounds. In this study, we used natural antioxidants of various structures: phenolic acids, flavonoids, peptides and corresponding amino acids, ascorbic acid and α-tocopherol, and also synthetic analogues of selected compounds. The curves of dependence of the measured absorbance on the concentration of antioxidants were described, the ranges of linearity were determined, and the value of the error made when reading in various ranges of dependencies was estimated. We also determined and compared the activity values using two popular methods (IC₅₀ and TEAC), taking into account different environments and reaction times. Based on the collected data, recommendations were formulated regarding the reaction conditions adapted to the studies of individual groups of antioxidants, and unified reaction times were proposed. Taking into account the state before reaching the equilibrium of antioxidants reacting in a complex manner, this approach may introduce a simplified reference to the competing reaction that occurs in reality.

In the presented study, starch of two cultivars of field bean was modified via the heat-moisture treatment (HMT) at various moisture contents (15 and 30%) and temperatures (100 and 120 °C) to determine HMT effect on its physicochemical properties and digestibility. Non-modified (NM) starches showed only slight variation in properties, with the tested varieties differing only in slowly digestible starch (SDS) and resistant starch (RS) content. The HMT was shown to decrease the swelling power and amylose leaching and higher phase transition temperatures and wider gelatinization temperature ranges in all modification conditions. These effects were caused by changes in the starch structure, as evidenced by the observed the decrease in relative crystallinity. The changes were the most pronounced in the starches treated at the higher moisture level. The HMT modification modified also starch digestibility. The total content of SDS and RS in non-gelatinized HMT starches modified at 15% moisture content was higher than that determined in the starch modified at 30% moisture content. In most gelatinized HMT starches, the SDS content decreased and that of RS did not change significantly compared to the native starch. Despite modified physicochemical properties, those starches still represent a good source of resistant starch.