RESUMEN

The proposed role of anthocyanins in protecting plants against excess solar radiation is consistent with the occurrence of ultrafast (5-25 ps) excited-state proton transfer as the major de-excitation pathway of these molecules. However, because natural anthocyanins absorb mainly in the visible region of the spectra, with only a narrow absorption band in the UV-B region, this highly efficient deactivation mechanism would essentially only protect the plant from visible light. On the other hand, ground-state charge-transfer complexes of anthocyanins with naturally occurring electron-donor co-pigments, such as hydroxylated flavones, flavonoids, and hydroxycinnamic or benzoic acids, do exhibit high UV-B absorptivities that complement that of the anthocyanins. In this work, we report a comparative study of the photophysics of the naturally occurring anthocyanin cyanin, intermolecular cyanin-coumaric acid complexes, and an acylated anthocyanin, that is, cyanin with a pendant coumaric ester co-pigment. Both inter- and intramolecular anthocyanin-co-pigment complexes are shown to have ultrafast energy dissipation pathways comparable to those of model flavylium cation-co-pigment complexes. However, from the standpoint of photoprotection, the results indicate that the covalent attachment of co-pigment molecules to the anthocyanin represents a much more efficient strategy by providing the plant with significant UV-B absorption capacity and at the same time coupling this absorption to efficient energy dissipation pathways (ultrafast internal conversion of the complexed form and fast energy transfer from the excited co-pigment to the anthocyanin followed by adiabatic proton transfer) that avoid net photochemical damage.

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RESUMEN

A simple procedure based on solid-phase extraction and high performance liquid chromatography coupled to diode array detector has been developed and validated for the qualitative and quantitative analysis of cis- and trans-resveratrol in wines. The method was linear from 0.025 (lower limit of quantitation, LLOQ) to 15 µg/mL for trans-resveratrol and from 0.023 (LLOQ) to 0.92 µg/mL for cis-resveratrol, with correlation coefficients higher than 0.99 for both isomers. Intra- and interday precision and accuracy were in conformity with the criteria normally accepted in method validation, that is, CVs inferior to 15% and mean relative errors within a ±14% interval. The extraction presented mean efficiencies close to 100% for both analytes. The validated methodology was applied to 186 Portuguese red wines from different regions, grape varieties and vintage. The results obtained showed that the content of trans-resveratrol in red wines ranged from 0.05 to 10.9 µg/mL, while the concentrations of cis-resveratrol ranged from 0.04 to 8.71 µg/mL.

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RESUMEN

The synthetic flavylium salt 4-carboxy-7-hydroxy-4'-methoxyflavylium chloride (CHMF) exhibits two acid-base equilibria in the range of pH 1-8 in both aqueous and micellar sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) solutions. The values of pK(a1) and pK(a2) for the cation-zwitterion (AH(2)(+) <--> Z + H(+)) and the zwitterion-base (Z <--> A(-) + H(+)) equilibria increase from 0.73 and 4.84 in water to 2.77 and 5.64 in SDS micelles, respectively. The kinetic study of the Z <--> A(-) + H(+) ground-state reactions in SDS points to the diffusion-controlled protonation of A(-) in the aqueous phase (k(p2w) = 4.2 x 10(10) M(-)(1) s(-)(1)) and in the micelle (k(p2m) = 2.3 x 10(11) M(-)(1) s(-)(1)). The deprotonation rate of Z did not significantly change upon going from water (k(d2) = 6.3 x 10(5) s(-)(1)) to SDS (k(d2) = 5.2 x 10(5) s(-)(1)), in contrast with the behavior of ordinary cationic flavylium salts, for which k(d2) strongly decreases in SDS micelles. These results suggest that deprotonation of the zwitterionic acid is not substantially perturbed by the micellar charge. Electronic excitation of the Z form of CHMF induces fast adiabatic deprotonation of the hydroxyl group of Z() (2.9 x 10(10) s(-)(1) in water and 8.4 x 10(9) s(-)(1) in 0.1 M SDS), followed by geminate recombination on the picosecond time scale. Interestingly, while recombination in water (k(rec) = 1.7 x 10(9) s(-)(1)) occurs preferentially at the carboxylate group, at the SDS micelle surface, recombination (k(rec) = 9.2 x 10(9) s(-)(1)) occurs at the hydroxyl group. The important conclusion is that proton mobility at the SDS micelle surface is substantially reduced with respect to the mobility in water, which implies that geminate recombination should be a general phenomenon in SDS micelles.

RESUMEN

Synthetic and natural hydroxyflavylium salts are super-photoacids, exhibiting values of the rate constant for proton transfer to water in the excited state as high as 1.5 x 10(11) s(-1). The synthetic flavylium salt 4-carboxy-7-hydroxy-4'-methoxyflavylium chloride (CHMF) has an additional carboxyl group at the 4-position of the flavylium cation that deprotonates in the ground state at a lower pH (pK(a1) = 0.73; AH2+ --> Z) than the 7-hydroxy group (pK(a2) = 4.84; Z --> A-). Ground-state deprotonation of the carboxyl group of the acid (AH2+) to form the zwitterion (Z) is too fast to be detected by nanosecond laser flash perturbation of the ground-state equilibrium, while deprotonation of the hydroxyl group of Z to form the anionic base (A-) occurs in the microsecond time range (k(d2) = 0.6 x 10(6) s(-1) and k(p2) = 4.2 x 10(10) M(-1) x s(-1)). In the excited state, the cationic form (AH2+) deprotonates in approximately 9 ps, resulting in the excited neutral base form (AH), which is unstable in the ground state. Deprotonation of Z occurs in 30 ps (k(d2) = 2.9 x 10(10) s(-1)), to form excited A-, which either reprotonates (k(p3)* = 3.7 x 10(10) M(-1) x s(-1)) or decays in 149 ps, and shows an important contribution from geminate recombination to give the excited neutral base (AH). Predominant reprotonation of A- at the carboxylate group reflects both the presence of the negative charge on the carboxylate and the increase in the excited-state pK(a) of the carboxyl group. Thus, while the hydroxyl pK(a) decreases by approximately 5 units upon going from the ground state (pK(a) = 4.84) to the excited state (pK(a) = -0.2), that of the carboxyl group increases by at least this much. Consequently, the excited state of the Z form of CHMF acts as a molecular proton transporter in the picosecond time range.