This study examined the effect of dietary carotenoid availability on carotenoid and retinoid concentrations in the flesh, plasma, skin and eggs of female Chinook salmon Oncorhynchus tshawytscha. Carotenoid concentrations in all tissues were closely related to dietary availability. Early in the breeding season, carotenoids were stored primarily in the muscle, with a flesh carotenoid concentratio...

In wild birds, the proximate and ultimate factors that affect circulating carotenoid concentrations remain poorly understood. We studied variation in plasma carotenoid concentrations across several scales: annual, seasonal, pair, territory and individual, and evaluated whether carotenoid levels explained reproductive outcome of wild American kestrels (Falco sparverius). We sampled plasma carote...

The factors that regulate storage organ carotenoid content remain to be fully elucidated, despite the nutritional and economic importance of this class of compound. Recent findings suggest that carotenoid pool size is determined, at least in part, by the activity of carotenoid cleavage dioxygenases. The aim of this study was to investigate whether Carotenoid Cleavage Dioxygenase4 (CCD4) activit...

In the present study, to investigate the mechanisms regulating carotenoid accumulation in citrus, a culture system was set up in vitro with juice sacs of three citrus varieties, Satsuma mandarin (Citrus unshiu Marc.), Valencia orange (Citrus sinensis Osbeck), and Lisbon lemon (Citrus limon Burm.f.). The juice sacs of all the three varieties enlarged gradually with carotenoid accumulation. The c...

Carotenoid pigments are a widespread source of ornamental coloration in vertebrates and expression of carotenoid-based colour displays has been shown to serve as an important criterion in female mate choice in birds and fishes. Unlike other integumentary pigments, carotenoids cannot be synthesized; they must be ingested. Carotenoid-based coloration is condition-dependent and has been shown to b...

to assess nickel-induced toxicity in plants, zea mays seeds were germinated and cultured on nutrient solution with nickel concentrations of 0, 50, 100 and 200 μm for a period of two weeks. its effects on the growth, hill reaction and photosynthetic pigments content were then investigated. the fresh and dry weight of leaves and roots increased in 50 μm nickel, but decreased in 100 and 200 μm. th...

BACKGROUND Animals use carotenoid-pigments for coloration, as antioxidants and as enhancers of the immune system. Carotenoid-dependent colours can thus signal individual quality and carotenoids have also been suggested to mediate life-history trade-offs. METHODOLOGY To examine trade-offs in carotenoid allocation between parents and the young, or between skin coloration and plasma of the paren...

Potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) tubers contain a wide range of carotenoid contents. To decipher the key factors controlling carotenoid levels in tubers, four potato lines (Atlantic, Désirée, 91E22 and POR03) were examined by a combination of biochemical, molecular and genomics approaches. These lines contained incremental levels of carotenoids, which were found to be associated with enhanced capa...

Based on experimental observations made in photosynthetic organ— isms which lacked colored carotenoid pigments, a hypothesis was developed that these pigments could serve as protective agents against photosensi— tized oxidations. Over the last 20 years, many workers have confirmed this hypothesis and have extended the observations to non—photosynthetic bacteria, plants and animals. It has also ...

objective(s): carotenoids which are naturally synthesized by fungi such as yeasts can act as an antioxidant which is closely related to their ability to decrease the risk of a variety of degenerative diseases. in recent years, the increase of demand for carotenoids obtained from natural sources has promoted major efforts to improve carotenoid production from biological sources such as pigmented...