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Anthocyanins are important bioactive supplements that are consumed from multiple foods and beverage products. Screening tea cultivars producing a high level of anthocyanins can help to enrich the edible bioactive supplements. ‘Zijuan’ (ZJ) is a tea cultivar growing purple shoots rich in anthocyanins, but it is susceptible to freezing winter and sprouts late in spring. Hybridisation using ‘ZJ’ as the female parent and an early sprouting cultivar ‘Wuniuzao’ as the male parent was carried out, and four hybrids with purple leaves were obtained. The quality of anthocyanins, catechins, caffeine and amino acids in shoots with three leaves and a bud of the purple leaf hybrids obtained were determined based on the field investigation on sprouting time in spring, winter resistance and leaf yield. It showed that hybrid ‘B-2’ sprouted earlier in the spring, contained a higher level of anthocyanins and also showed good performance in winter resistance than its female parent ‘ZJ’. It also showed that black tea processing induced a marked decrease in foliar anthocyanins, but green tea processing had little effect on the foliar anthocyanins. Purple tea leaves should be prepared into unfermented green tea instead of fermented black tea to preserve the high level of anthocyanins in the final tea products.

Summary: To have a better understanding of regulatory mechanism of carotenoid accumulation in sweetcorn (Zea mays L.), we analysed carotenoid profiles, expression patterns of carotenogenic genes and antioxidant activities in two genotypes of sweetcorn during kernel development. The results suggested that the expression of carotenogenic genes played an essential role in carotenoid accumulation and higher expression levels of carotenogenic genes obviously led to higher levels of total carotenoids. It was found that the expression of upstream genes (ZmPDS,ZmZDS and ZmCRTISO) had major influence on the content of total carotenoid during kernel development. The accumulation of lycopene was closely related to the coordination of upstream and downstream genes. The expression of ZmHYD and ZmZEP was influential on zeaxanthin accumulation, which was also influenced by the rate of ZmCHYB/ZmCHYE. Expression levels of ZmCHYE were still stable in order for α‐xanthophylls largely accumulated during kernel development. Lutein, zeaxanthin, α‐cryptoxanthin and β‐cryptoxanthin constituted the predominant carotenoids in sweetcorn. Two essential stages for carotenoid accumulation were found in sweetcorn during kernel development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To clarify the effects of MTHFR C677 T polymorphism on the risk of diabetic nephropathy ( DN) in the Chinese population, an updated meta-analysis was performed. Related studies were identified from Pub Med, Springer Link, Ovid and Chinese Databases up to 24 February 2015. A total of 15 studies including 1227 DN cases, 586 healthy controls and 1277 diabetes mellitus ( DM) controls were involved in this meta-analysis. Overall, a significantly elevated risk of DN was associated with all variants of MTHFR C677 T when compared with the healthy group (T vs C, odds ratio ( OR) = 2.22, 95% confidence interval ( CI) = 1.88-2.61; TT vs CC, OR = 4.22, 95% CI = 3.02-5.90; TT + CT vs CC, OR = 2.62, 95% CI = 2.07-3.31; TT vs CC + CT, OR = 2.81, 95% CI = 2.08-3.81) or DM ( T vs C, OR = 1.78, 95% CI = 1.59-2.00; TT vs CC, OR = 2.95, 95% CI = 2.33-3.73; TT + CT vs CC, OR = 1.93, 95% CI = 1.63-2.29; TT vs CC + CT, OR = 2.31, 95% CI = 1.87-2.84). In subgroup analyses stratified by ethnicity and geographic areas, it revealed the significant results in Chinese Han, in North and South China. The risk conferred by MTHFR C677 T polymorphism is higher in North China than in South China. This meta-analysis showed that the MTHFR C677 T variants may influence DN risk in Chinese, and further studies with gene-gene and gene-environment interactions are required for definite conclusions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sweet corn kernels were used in this research to study the dynamics of vitamin E, by evaluatingthe expression levels of genes involved in vitamin E synthesis, the accumulation of vitamin E, and the antioxidant activity during the different stage of kernel development. Results showed that expression levels of Zm HPT and Zm TC genes increased, whereas Zm TMT gene dramatically decreased during kernel development. The contents of all the types of vitamin E in sweet corn had a significant upward increase during kernel development, and reached the highest level at 30 days after pollination (DAP). Amongst the eight isomers of vitamin E, the content of γ-tocotrienol was the highest, and increased by 14.9 folds, followed by α-tocopherolwith an increase of 22 folds, and thecontents of isomers γ-tocopherol, α-tocotrienol, δ-tocopherol,δ-tocotrienol, and β-tocopherol were also followed during kernel development. The antioxidant activity of sweet corn during kernel development was increased, and was up to 101.8 ± 22.3 μmol of α-tocopherol equivlent/100 g in fresh weight (FW) at 30 DAP. There was a positive correlation between vitamin E contents and antioxidant activity in sweet corn during the kernel development, and a negative correlation between the expressions of Zm TMT gene and vitamin E contents. These results revealed the relations amongst the content of vitamin E isomers and the gene expression, vitamin E accumulation, and antioxidant activity. The study can provide a harvesting strategy for vitamin E bio-fortification in sweet corn., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest. The founding sponsors had no role in the design of the study; collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; writing of the manuscript and the decision to publish the results.

A 2469 bp cDNA encoding entire fructose-6-phosphate, 2-kinase/fructose-2,6-bisphosphatase (F2KP) was cloned from maize (Zea mays L.cv. Ziyunuo 1) by the methods of RT-PCR and rapid amplification of cDNA ends(RACE), on the basis of AF007582, which was isolated from "Yedan 4". The cDNA was designated as mF2KP and the GenBank accession number is AF334143, which contains a 2226 bp open reading from (ORF), encoding a 741 residue polypeptide. There are some differences between the F2KP genes of two maize varieties. The length of 3' non-coding region of mF2KP is 38 bp shorter than that of AF007582. On the 1592th, 1593th and 1605th positions of mF2KP, there is an additional nucleotide respectively compared with AF007582, which cause a shifted reading frame in a small region. Northern blot showed that the expression of mF2KP were significantly different among maize tissues. The Transcription of mF2KP in stem was lower than those in leaves, kernel leaves and male inflorescence, but much higher than that in immature seeds.