FT-IR provides information on the structural order of starch chains near the granule surface, since the infrared beam penetrates only to a depth of 2 μm into the granule (Sevenou, Hill, Farhat, & Mitchell, 2002). All infrared spectra were obtained on a Nicolet Nexus 470 spectrometer (Thermo Electron Corporation, Waltham, MA, USA) equipped with a deuterated triglycine sulphate (DTGS) detector using the Digilab attenuated total reflectance (ATR) accessory at 4 cm−1 resolution by 64 scans. Each spectrum was recorded against an empty cell as background and was subtracted from the spectrum of air. Spectra were baseline-corrected and deconvoluted by drawing a straight line at 1200 cm−1 and 800 cm−1 (using Omnic version 6.2 software). The absorbance ratio of 1047 cm−1/1022 cm−1 was obtained from the deconvoluted spectra.