Traditional tropical agriculture often entails a form of slash-and-burn land management that may adversely affect ecosystem services such as pollination, which are required for successful crop yields. The Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico has a >4000 year history of traditional slash-and-burn agriculture, termed 'milpa'. Hot 'Habanero' chilli is a major pollinator-dependent crop that nowadays is ofte...

The Commission Decision of EC dated 20 June 2003, on emergency measures concerning hot chilli and hot chilli products coming into any EC member state, required that the consignments of such products should be accompanied by an analytical report showing that they are free of artificial dye Sudan I. The opportunity to set a confirmatory method is evident, and the paper proposes a HPLC/APCI-MS met...

Ethyl methanesulfonate is a synthetic compound widely used as a mutagen, teratogen and brain carcinogen and as a research chemical. While, the toxicity and carcinogenicity of ethyl methanesulfonate on humans and animals have been studied, less is known about its genotoxicity to plants. In this study, the genotoxic effects of ethyl methanesulfonate were investigated with growing chilli seedlings...

Some psyllids transmit 'Candidatus Liberibacter solanacearum' (Lso), the causal agent of devastating plant diseases cultivated Solanaceae and Apiaceae. The recent detection Bactericera cockerelli Lso in Ecuador seriously threatens these crops South America. There, neither role native epidemiology nor psyllid fauna vegetables are known. With aim to identify potential vectors risk scenarios for s...

Plants are the source of numerous pharmaceutically important compounds that have been employed to cure various human ailments since ancient times. With assistance modern chemistry and materials science, such identified isolated produce new drugs. Alkaloids one most significant classes naturally occurring secondary-metabolites, which synthesized widely distributed in parts plants. They regulate ...

The intragastric infusion of red chilli powder in dosage of 1.6 and 0.8 g/hr caused a marked increase in the DNA content of the gastric aspirate compared with basal values for DNA. This observation suggests a rapid and marked exfoliation of gastric surface epithelial cells in human subjects given red chilli powder.

The genus Capsicum provides antioxidant compounds, such as phenolics and carotenoids, into the diet. In Mexico, there is a wide diversity of species and varieties of chilli peppers, a fruit which has local cultural and gastronomic importance. In the present study, the relationship of the carotenoid and phenolic profiles with the RAPD fingerprint of three different commercial cultivars of chilli...