This paper reports the application of near-infrared (NIR) reflectance spectroscopy to determine the concentration in honey of perseitol, a sugar that is specific to avocado honey. Reference values for perseitol were obtained by high-performance liquid chromatography analysis in 109 honey samples. Although the average concentration of perseitol in honey samples was only 0.48%, accurate predictio...

BACKGROUND Symptomatic slow-acting drugs (SYSADOA) have been largely studied over the last decade. The objective of this study is to prepare a document providing recommendations for the use of SYSADOA in osteoarthritis (OA). METHODS The following interventions were taken into consideration: avocado/soybean unsaponifiables, chondroitin sulfate, diacereine, glucosamine sulfate, hyaluronic acid,...

Antimicrobial therapy is a useful tool to control infectious diseases in general and rising antibiotic resistant microorganisms in particular. Alternative strategies are desirable, and antimicrobial peptides (AMP) represent attractive control agents. Mexican avocado (Persea americana var. drymifolia) is used in traditional medicine; however, the AMP production has not been reported in this plan...

In the last 5 years our laboratory has refined the RT-PCR test for ASBVd detection in avocado and succeeded in having this test approved for registration of foundation stock trees by CDFA (Mathews et al., 1997). Several other researchers as well as many growers have had their plants tested by our laboratory which has helped to prevent the distribution of infected sources of plant material as we...

Iron chlorosis is a very common disorder of crops grown in calcareous soils. It is well known that the total iron concentration in leaves is not a valid index for iron nutritional status of crops and that the total iron concentration in chlorotic leaves are often similar or even greater than in the green leaves. In this study, we compare three extraction methods for iron deficiency diagnosis in...

Experience with tip grafting avocados has shown that there are distinct seasonal differences in success. Grafts made during the winter and early spring months, especially in January, February, and early March, are nearly 100 per cent successful, while in late spring, summer, and early fall the percentages are often much lower. This is especially true with certain varieties. For example, results...

The plus and minus RNAs of the 247 nt avocado sunblotch viroid (ASBV) undergo site specific RNA self-cleavage reactions in vitro. As with several other self-cleaving RNAs, we proposed hammerhead secondary structures for the sequence around the site of self-cleavage of both RNAs. We have shown previously that, during transcription of a dimeric plus ASBV RNA, a double-hammerhead structure formed ...