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A Plant's Only Purpose

Is To Regenerate and Propagate The Species

How's that for a provoking thought?

Focus your thought on the most delicious berry you've ever eaten.

For example, a Marionberry -- Queen of North American berries --

is the sweet, aromatic, juicy blackberry from Oregon.

Marionberry (Rubus ursinus & idaeus hybrid, courtesy of the Oregon Raspberry and Blackberry Commission

For characteristics, why has Nature made it black, shiny, juicy, aromatic?

Given this as a premise, we can focus on how a plant uses its pigments to protect its seeds which store the genetic material for regeneration and propagation.

Why is this of interest to consumers like us?

Here are some simple relationships drawing all this together --

read them from top to bottom :

• pigments are colors

• to consumers, colors represent freshness and familiar tastes and flavors of favored plant foods

• colors can be used a guide during shopping in the "5 a day" plan for healthier diets

• pigments and colors are also a subjective index for choosing plant foods specifically for antioxidant or ORAC strength because...

• a general rule in science: "pigment-richness" ---> is proportional to intensity of color ---> which is proportional to phenolic-richness ---> which is proportional to ORAC (antioxidant strength)

• therefore, if your 5 a day plan includes achieving optimal antioxidant richness in your foods, choose those with bright colors

• this is why berries are such a convenient food group for gaining antioxidant value

The Berry as a Seed Vault

A berry is like a vault that contains layers of protection and nutrients to sustain the plant embryo (seeds) via its pulp, very much in design like an egg shell and white surrounding a yolk. It can be argued that all these resources exist to assure health of the seeds until they are ready for germination in the next generation.

Pigment Power

Pigments are chemicals that absorb light in different spectra, each corresponding to a different color that becomes the characteristic of certain plants.

In all cases, a single pigment does not exist alone to impart color, but rather participates among dozens to hundreds of different but similar pigments in the same plant, assuring a synergy of color and protective benefits. Consequently, there is extensive overlap of pigmentation in individual plants.

Some 8,000 individual pigment chemicals exist in the plant world!

Among the brightest colors across plants are red, orange, yellow, blue, violet and green, some species having a combination of several colors whereas others are predominantly and characteristically one main color.

Even that one color, however, is made up of perhaps hundreds of similar chemicals in the same plant.

Pigments in Skin or Pulp?

One of the most interesting fruits in Nature is the mangosteen

(Garcinia mangostana, which is not a berry)

Mangosteen gives us a perfect example of a brightly pigmented plant having a deep purple, intensely pigmented outer rind (the "exocarp", not edible) surrounding a perfectly-white, unpigmented fruit pulp (which happens to be one of the most delicious fruits imaginable -- you can find them in some Chinatowns).

Although some plant species contain rich internal pigmentation of their pulp, this is rare. The majority of pigments reside in the outer layers exposed to the environment – the exocarp, skin, peel or rind. Of interest is that seeds of many plants also contain pigments that are evidently stored for development in the new plant.

Pigments are one of the most versatile and powerful chemical classes in nature, as they serve a variety of protective functions that can be grouped in 5 or more ways.

1.Ultraviolet protection. Plants are constantly exposed in a sea of sunlight and ultraviolet radiation that would damage DNA and normal cell function if not buffered by pigments.

2. Antioxidant protection. Chemically, pigments have structures suitable for quenching the avid search by reactive oxygen species (ROS) for free electrons. During photosynthesis in plants or normal oxidative metabolism in animals, ROS are generated perpetually in short-lived reactions yielding their unstable chemical structure devoid of one electron. Internal and dietary antioxidant chemicals such as plant pigments contain carbon atoms joined by a double bond that is an ideal source for electron donation, providing the neutralizing effect on ROS. This is the main health value for humans to gain antioxidant protection by eating colorful foods.

3. Astringency, a repellent effect. Most pigments are mild acids (such as phenolic acids) that collectively create an acidic, bitter nature to plant components where the pigments exist, such as in leaves, stem and berry. Vitamin C, also called ascorbic acid, is usually rich in colorful plants and contributes to acidity and astringency. The sourness of cranberries is an example of astringency. To predatory insects that may bear diseases or cause injury to the berry leading to disease and demise, the astringent property of multiple phenolic acids serves as a repellent.

4. Pest control. In addition to insects, berries and other colorful plants are constantly exposed to wind-, soil- and animal-borne diseases, such as viruses, bacteria, fungi and parasites. The acidic nature of the heavily pigmented skin serves as a protective guard against these pests in the nearby environment.

5. Attractant. The same pigment chemicals that ward off pests are present to attract “desirable” predators that can consume the seed-containing fruit and disperse seeds in droppings a distance from the origin plant, assuring the widest regeneration possible. Bees and their pollinating functions are also attracted to colorful plants. In addition to the obvious advantage of attractive colors, pigments harbor the qualities of fragrance and taste, making the berry appealing for consumption.

NEXT!

• Part 2: berry pigment classes and antioxidant strength

• Part 3: plants making pigments -- when stress is good

• Part 4: berry pigments and free radicals -- friends and foes

Reading

* Joseph JA, Nadeau DA, Underwood A. The Color Code, 2002, Hyperion Press, New York.

* Simon PW. Plant Pigments for Color and Nutrition, US Department of Agriculture and University of Wisconsin.

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Dr. Paul
The Berry Doctor