Crude Fiber

Crude Fiber
Crude fiber is a measure if the quantity of indigestible cellulose, pentosans, lignin, and other components of this type in present foods. These components have little food value but provide the bulk necessary for proper peristaltic action in the intestinal tract.

Recent research into the roles of dietary fiber components has caused reevaluation if some of the traditional concepts concerning fiber. Actually, dietary fiber may be an unfortunate misnomer; a term such as nondigestible portion may be correct since this dietary component may or may not have a fibrous structure.

The nondigestoble or dietary fiber fraction is a complex mixture of different substance. The major ones are cellulose, the glucose polymer that is predominant material of plant cells; hemicellulose, a shorter version of cellulose: pectin, the glue that binds plant cells together with cellulose form the woody cell walls of plants.

Dietary fiber acts to lower the concentration of low density lipoprotein choletsrol in the blood, possibly by binding with bile acids. The lignin fraction has been identified as the possible binding agent.
Crude Fiber