Copigmentation is a phenomenon where pigmentation due to
anthocyanidin
Anthocyanidins are common plant pigments, the sugar-free counterparts of anthocyanins. They are based on the flavylium cation, an oxonium ion, with various groups substituted for its hydrogen atoms. They generally change color from red through ...
s is reinforced by the presence of other colorless
flavonoid
Flavonoids (or bioflavonoids; from the Latin word ''flavus'', meaning yellow, their color in nature) are a class of polyphenolic secondary metabolites found in plants, and thus commonly consumed in the diets of humans.
Chemically, flavonoids ...
s known as cofactors or “copigments”. This occurs by the formation of a non-covalently-linked
complex
Complex commonly refers to:
* Complexity, the behaviour of a system whose components interact in multiple ways so possible interactions are difficult to describe
** Complex system, a system composed of many components which may interact with each ...
.
Examples
;Flowers
An example is the bluish purple flowers of the Japanese garden iris (''
Iris ensata
''Iris ensata'', the Japanese iris or Japanese water iris ( Japanese: ''hanashōbu''), formerly ''I. kaempferi'', is a species of flowering plant in the family Iridaceae, native to Japan, China, Korea and Russia, and widely cultivated as an orna ...
''). The characteristic floral
jade coloration of ''
Strongylodon macrobotrys'' has been shown to be an example of copigmentation, a result of the presence of
malvin (the anthocyanin) and
saponarin (a
flavone
Flavone is an organic compound with the formula . A white solid, flavone is a derivative of chromone with a phenyl (Ph) substituent adjacent to the ether group. The compound is of little direct practical importance, but susbstituted derivatives, ...
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 ...
) in the ratio 1:9.
[Greenish blue flower colour of Strongylodon macrobotrys. Kosaku Takeda, Aki Fujii, Yohko Senda and Tsukasa Iwashina, Biochemical Systematics and Ecology, Volume 38, Issue 4, August 2010, Pages 630–633, ]
;Berries
It is a phenomenon observed in the berry color of the porcelain berry (''
Ampelopsis glandulosa
''Ampelopsis glandulosa'' is a species of plant native to China, Japan, India, Nepal, Myanmar, Vietnam, and the Philippines.
Varieties
Several varieties are distinguished:
* var. ''hancei''
* var. ''kulingensis''
* var. ''glandulosa''
* var ...
'').
;Food
Part of the
color of red wine can be due to the copigmentation phenomenon. Copigmentation is only important during the early stages of a wine's age. Anthocyanins begin to polymerize with other wine compounds, such as hydroxycinnamic acids, tannins, glyceraldehyde or proteins, to form more complex structures with covalent C–C bonds.
[Transformation of stacked π–π-stabilized malvidin-3-O-glucoside — Catechin complexes towards polymeric structures followed by anisotropy decay study. Sándor Kunsági-Máté, Bianca May, Christopher Tschiersch, Dirk Fetzer, Ibolya Horváth, László Kollár, Martin Pour Nikfardjam, Food Research International, Volume 44, Issue 1, January 2011, Pages 23–27, ]
See also
*
Metalloanthocyanin
References
External links
Copigmentation reactions and color stability of berry anthocyanins. Academic dissertation by Maarit Rein, Helsinki 2005
{{Anthocyanidin
Pigmentation
Anthocyanidins
Plant physiology