Magnolia seed carotenoid pigments: Typical evolutionarily-static relicts?
✍ Scribed by A.J. Bauman; Henry Yokoyama
- Book ID
- 104155222
- Publisher
- Elsevier Science
- Year
- 1975
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 542 KB
- Volume
- 53
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0022-5193
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
L'aviron est d'ivoire Le pavilion de moire Le gouvernail d'or fin J'ai pour lest une orange Pour voile une aile d'ange, Pour mousse un sdraphin." Th. Gautier, Po6sies diverses
Lycopene is the main pigment, with small amounts of #-carotene(s), in the red seed coats of archaic plants such as magnolias. It is suggested that this simple mixture is a relict color attractant which co-evolved with seedeating birds in a "coupled symbiosis" which has inhibited further genetic expression change in the chromoplast system. The complex pigments of advanced fruit such as oranges co-evolved with primate mammals as an adaptation to their rod-cone Purkinje shift color contrast vision in poor light. The evidence which supports these hypotheses and their implications is discussed.