Chrysanthemin is an

anthocyanin Anthocyanins (), also called anthocyans, are water-soluble vacuolar pigments that, depending on their pH, may appear red, purple, blue, or black. In 1835, the German pharmacist Ludwig Clamor Marquart gave the name Anthokyan to a chemical compo ...

. It is the 3-

glucoside A glucoside is a glycoside that is derived from glucose. Glucosides are common in plants, but rare in animals. Glucose is produced when a glucoside is hydrolysed by purely chemical means, or decomposed by fermentation or enzymes. The name was o ...

cyanidin Cyanidin is a natural organic compound. It is a particular type of anthocyanidin (glycoside version called anthocyanins). It is a pigment found in many red berries including grapes, bilberry, blackberry, blueberry, cherry, chokeberry, cranb ...

Natural occurrences

Chrysanthemin can be found in the roselle plant (''Hibiscus sabdariffa'', Malvaceae), different Japanese

angiosperm Flowering plants are plants that bear flowers and fruits, and form the clade Angiospermae (), commonly called angiosperms. The term "angiosperm" is derived from the Greek words ('container, vessel') and ('seed'), and refers to those plants th ...

s, ''

Rhaponticum ''Rhaponticum'' is a genus of flowering plants in the tribe Cardueae within the family Asteraceae. Description ''Rhaponticum'' species are perennial herbaceous plants with simple, rarely branched stems. The leaves are simple to pinnatifid. T ...

'' (Asteraceae), The fruits of the smooth arrowwood (''

Viburnum dentatum ''Viburnum dentatum'', southern arrowwood or arrowwood viburnum or roughish arrowwood, is a small shrub, native to the eastern United States and Canada from Maine south to northern Florida and eastern Texas. Like most '' Viburnum'', it has oppos ...

'', Caprifoliaceae) appear blue. One of the major pigments is cyanidin 3-glucoside, but the total mixture is very complex.

In food

Chrysanthemin has been detected in blackcurrant pomace, in European elderberry, in red raspberries, in

soybean The soybean, soy bean, or soya bean (''Glycine max'') is a species of legume native to East Asia, widely grown for its edible bean, which has numerous uses. Traditional unfermented food uses of soybeans include soy milk, from which tofu an ...

seed coats, in

Victoria plum The Victoria plum is a type of English plum. It has a yellow flesh with a red or mottled skin. This plum is a cultivar of the egg plum group (''Prunus domestica'' ssp. ''intermedia''). The fruit is oval or ovate in shape. The ground colour ...

, in

peach The peach (''Prunus persica'') is a deciduous tree first domesticated and cultivated in Zhejiang province of Eastern China. It bears edible juicy fruits with various characteristics, most called peaches and others (the glossy-skinned, non-fu ...

lychee Lychee (US: ; UK: ; ''Litchi chinensis''; ) is a Monotypic taxon, monotypic taxon and the sole member in the genus ''Litchi'' in the Sapindus, soapberry family, ''Sapindaceae''. It is a tropical tree native to Southeast and Southwest China (t ...

and açaí. It is found in

red orange The blood orange is a variety of orange ( ''Citrus'' × ''sinensis'') (also referred to as raspberry orange) with crimson, almost blood-colored flesh. The distinctive dark flesh color is due to the presence of anthocyanins, a family of polyp ...

s and black rice. It is the major anthocyanin in

purple corn Purple corn ( es, maíz morado) or purple maize is group of flint maize varieties ( Zea mays indurata) originating in South America, descended from a common ancestral variety termed "k'culli" in Quechua. It is most commonly grown in the Andes of Pe ...

(''Zea mays''). Purple corn is approved in Japan and listed in the "

Existing Food Additive List The International Numbering System for Food Additives (INS) is a European-based naming system for food additives, aimed at providing a short designation of what may be a lengthy actual name."Class Names and the International Numbering System for F ...

" as ''purple corn color''.

Biosynthesis

The biosynthesis of cyanidin 3-O-glucoside in ''

Escherichia coli ''Escherichia coli'' (),Wells, J. C. (2000) Longman Pronunciation Dictionary. Harlow ngland Pearson Education Ltd. also known as ''E. coli'' (), is a Gram-negative, facultative anaerobic, rod-shaped, coliform bacterium of the genus ''Escher ...

'' was demonstrated by means of genetic engineering. In ''

Arabidopsis thaliana ''Arabidopsis thaliana'', the thale cress, mouse-ear cress or arabidopsis, is a small flowering plant native to Eurasia and Africa. ''A. thaliana'' is considered a weed; it is found along the shoulders of roads and in disturbed land. A winter a ...

'', a

glycosyltransferase Glycosyltransferases (GTFs, Gtfs) are enzymes ( EC 2.4) that establish natural glycosidic linkages. They catalyze the transfer of saccharide moieties from an activated nucleotide sugar (also known as the "glycosyl donor") to a nucleophilic glycos ...

, UGT79B1, is involved in the anthocyanin biosynthetic pathway. UGT79B1 protein converts cyanidin 3-O-glucoside to cyanidin 3-O-xylosyl(1→2)glucoside.

References

{{Anthocyanins Anthocyanins Flavonoid glucosides