Litchi (Litchi chinensis Sonn.) is an important subtropical fruit in southern China and the fruit pericarp has attractive red skin at maturity, which is provided by anthocyanins accumulation. To understand the anthocyanin biosynthesis at post-transcriptional level, we investigated the roles of microRNAs (miRNAs) during fruit coloring. In the present study, four small RNA libraries and a mixed d...

Genistein (GNT), an isoflavone, is used in the clinical treatment of various health disorders. GNT is found in primary food source plants and some medical plants. However, studies on the functions of GNT in plants are rarely reported. In this study, we demonstrated that GNT plays an important role in promoting anthocyanin accumulation in red cabbage. GNT solutions (10, 20, 30, 40, and 50 mg/L) ...

Glucose induces anthocyanin accumulation in many plant species; however, the molecular mechanism involved in this process remains largely unknown. Here, we found that apple hexokinase MdHXK1, a glucose sensor, was involved in sensing exogenous glucose and regulating anthocyanin biosynthesis. In vitro and in vivo assays suggested that MdHXK1 interacted directly with and phosphorylated an anthocy...

Anthocyanins provide nutritional benefits and are responsible for red coloration in many fruits. Light affects anthocyanin biosynthesis in peach (Prunus persica). However, some cultivars show differential sensitivity to light. In the present study, 'Hujingmilu (HJ),' a naturally deeply colored cultivar, and 'Yulu (YL),' showing low pigmentation, were used to study the mechanism underlying UV-li...

Ultraviolet A (UV-A)-mediated regulation of anthocyanin biosynthesis was investigated in swollen hypocotyls of the red turnip 'Tsuda'. The shaded swollen hypocotyls which contained negligible anthocyanin were exposed to artificial light sources including low fluence UV-B, UV-A, blue, red, far-red, red plus UV-A, far-red plus UV-A, and blue plus red. Among these lights, only UV-A induced anthocy...

MYB transcription factors (TFs) are important regulators of flavonoid biosynthesis in plants. Here, we report MYB112 as a formerly unknown regulator of anthocyanin accumulation in Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana). Expression profiling after chemically induced overexpression of MYB112 identified 28 up- and 28 down-regulated genes 5 h after inducer treatment, including MYB7 and MYB32, which are...

The red coloration of litchi fruit depends on the accumulation of anthocyanins. The anthocyanins level in litchi fruit varies widely among cultivars, developmental stages and environmental stimuli. Previous studies on various plant species demonstrate that anthocyanin biosynthesis is controlled at the transcriptional level. Here, we describe a litchi R2R3-MYB transcription factor gene, LcMYB1, ...

Fruits of kiwifruit cultivars (Actinidia chinensis and A. deliciosa) generally have green or yellow flesh when ripe. A small number of genotypes have red flesh but this coloration is usually restricted to the inner pericarp. Three kiwifruit cultivars having red ('Hongyang'), or yellow ('Jinnong-2'), or green ('Hayward') flesh were investigated for their color characteristics and pigment content...

Anthocyanin in strawberries has a positive effect on fruit coloration. In this study, the role of exogenous hematin on anthocyanin biosynthesis was investigated. Our result showed that the white stage of strawberries treated with exogenous hematin had higher anthocyanin content, compared to the control group. Among all treatments, 5 μM of hematin was the optimal condition to promote color devel...

Developing seedlings of the Arabidopsis gun1 (genomes uncoupled1) mutant, which is defective in retrograde plastid-to-nucleus signalling, show several previously unrecognized mutant phenotypes. gun1 seedlings accumulated less anthocyanin than wild-type seedlings when grown in the presence of 2% (w/v) sucrose, due to lower amounts of transcripts of early anthocyanin biosynthesis genes in gun1. N...