4. Conclusions
Year effect was the main factor that influenced fruit yield and
polyphenols such as CA and Q. As the plants matured, the average
total yield per plant increased. The average CA was significantly
reduced in 2012, while the Q content was the lowest for all the
cultivars in 2010.
The FW and ACY did not significantly change between the years
of evaluation. Although there were some variations of fruit weight
and in the pattern of anthocyanin content from year to year, they
were much smaller than the general trends for cultivars. The yield,
fruit size and total anthocyanin contents obtained from any single
year were highly correlated to the average across the three years,
which makes pursuing the evaluation for these traits from a single
year and at an early stage of plant development a practical proposition.
This finding could permit large savings in time and resources
during selection of new blueberry cultivars, by cutting
the time required from 5 to 3 years.
Traditionally, blueberries have been bred primarily to optimise
the production and consumer attributes of taste and appearance
for fresh eating fruit. Little or no attention has been paid to optimising
polyphenol content for perceived heath attributes, or for
making polyphenol extracts for use in formulated functional foods.
We have introduced a different approach by additionally selecting
for a high polyphenol content and particularly for anthocyanins
that have potential health benefits. If blueberries were to be grown
for processing, particularly for manufacture of high-anthocyanin
polyphenol extract powders, then the most important factor would
be the overall yield of anthocyanins per hectare. Agronomic traits
would still be important, but consumer attributes much less so.
Our results show that for a given plant density, the total anthocyanin
content harvestable from a blueberry cultivation varies
greatly among cultivars. We estimated that the potential total
anthocyanin harvest from rabbiteye cultivars was higher than
those for southern highbush and northern highbush. For processing
purposes, ‘Velluto Blue’ and ‘Centra Blue’ would be clearly
4. Conclusions
Year effect was the main factor that influenced fruit yield and
polyphenols such as CA and Q. As the plants matured, the average
total yield per plant increased. The average CA was significantly
reduced in 2012, while the Q content was the lowest for all the
cultivars in 2010.
The FW and ACY did not significantly change between the years
of evaluation. Although there were some variations of fruit weight
and in the pattern of anthocyanin content from year to year, they
were much smaller than the general trends for cultivars. The yield,
fruit size and total anthocyanin contents obtained from any single
year were highly correlated to the average across the three years,
which makes pursuing the evaluation for these traits from a single
year and at an early stage of plant development a practical proposition.
This finding could permit large savings in time and resources
during selection of new blueberry cultivars, by cutting
the time required from 5 to 3 years.
Traditionally, blueberries have been bred primarily to optimise
the production and consumer attributes of taste and appearance
for fresh eating fruit. Little or no attention has been paid to optimising
polyphenol content for perceived heath attributes, or for
making polyphenol extracts for use in formulated functional foods.
We have introduced a different approach by additionally selecting
for a high polyphenol content and particularly for anthocyanins
that have potential health benefits. If blueberries were to be grown
for processing, particularly for manufacture of high-anthocyanin
polyphenol extract powders, then the most important factor would
be the overall yield of anthocyanins per hectare. Agronomic traits
would still be important, but consumer attributes much less so.
Our results show that for a given plant density, the total anthocyanin
content harvestable from a blueberry cultivation varies
greatly among cultivars. We estimated that the potential total
anthocyanin harvest from rabbiteye cultivars was higher than
those for southern highbush and northern highbush. For processing
purposes, ‘Velluto Blue’ and ‘Centra Blue’ would be clearly
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