Because they are more difficult to grow they’re considered all but obsolete in today’s produce world. And because the fruit deteriorates rapidly in cold storage, the older varieties are a mere remembrance fading in the rear view mirror—a tribute to a time when there was a fierce loyalty to varietal brand names. New school peach and nectarine varieties are all sugar and sweetness with very little acid. They have a rich pink/red hue to their skin, are firm fleshed, larger on average than the old varieties, and continue to ripen off the tree under refrigeration. They have a sublime, delicate flavor that is less peachy and more sugary. New school varieties include Arctic Supreme, Arctic Glo, White Lady, Sugar Lady, Snow Giant, and Arctic Jay . In general , white-fleshed varieties are sweeter than the more sugar/acid balanced, aromatic, yellow-fleshed varieties. A separate category of peaches, including Peento, Donut, Saturn or Bagel peaches , are synonyms for the smallest, sweetest, melting-fleshed peaches native to China. They are flat, small , and shaped like their name implies. They have a very short season and bruise more easily than any other type of peach.Compared to pome fruits, rootstock options are more limited with stone fruits. There are no truly dwarf stocks—the only choices are full-size and semi-dwarf. The principle attributes imparted to fruit trees via rootstocks are size control, disease/pest resistance, raspberry plant container and fruiting efficiency. Size Control – Full-size or standard stocks produce vigorous vegetative growth . Trees on these stocks will top out at 20–30 feet tall.
Semi-dwarfing stocks reduce tree size . Pest, Disease Resistance – The main issue with stone fruits is root susceptibility to nematodes , which are multicellular, microscopic non-segmented roundworms. Nematodes sap tree roots of nutrients, reduce vigor, and lower fruit productivity. The rootstocks Nemaguard and Nemared impart resistance, especially with peaches and nectarines. Fruiting Efficiency – Although not as dramatic as with pome fruits, stone fruit dwarfing rootstocks promote greater fruit production per area of tree canopy. The mechanisms for this are not fully understood, but the result is demonstrable.These are the plums of choice throughout Europe, more widely planted than apples and pears. In the Slavic countries Domestica plums exceed 50% of all acreage planted to fruit trees. There is evidence of Domestica plums being grown in Europe prior to 2,000 years ago. Commonly dubbed prune plums in the U.S., European plums offer a more diverse spectrum of colors, shapes, sizes, tastes, and uses than any other fruit. The fruit is small and oval-oblong—almost egg shaped. Skin colors are in the blue-purple range for prune types to yellow, orange, and red for dessert types. They thrive in areas with moderate summers , low humidity and moderate winter chill. Major production areas worldwide include Western U.S., New York state, Italy, Chile, Turkey, Romania, Yugoslavia, France, Austria, and Germany. The trees of European plums are upright and vigorous when young and develop a pendant weeping form and weak vigor when established. At 50–80 years they are fairly long-lived. The fruit buds are the longest lived of the stone fruits , so minimal renewal pruning is necessary. They tend to be a shorter tree than Japanese plums . European plums also have a higher chill requirement to bloom and set fruit and bloom later than their P. salicina counterparts, and in some years avoid the pollination problems caused by erratic spring weather and rain. They are self unfruitful and thus need pollen from another variety to set fruit.
The varieties Santa Rosa and Wickson are universal pollinators. European plums are smaller and firm textured, with less juice than Japanese plums. They are also free stone. Because of their high sugar content they dry readily as prune plums. Fresh off the tree, European plums are a high quality dessert fruit and because of their low juice content and freestone nature, are excellent candidates for cooking in tarts and other recipes.This species, known as the gage plums, originated in Turkey and was brought to Mediterranean Europe by the Romans. They all but disappeared during the Dark Ages of Medieval Europe and were rediscovered in France in the 1700s. Sir William Gage introduced the gages to England in the 1720s and subsequently both lost the varietal labels and named them after himself. The trees are weak to moderate in vigor and extremely narrow and upright. At their tree-ripe perfection in late July and August, the gages feature a green, yellow, or golden skin and a sugary sweet taste with slight tangy undertones that is arguably the most intensely rich-tasting fruit on the planet. True green gage plums are hard to find but worth the search.This species originated in China 2,000 years ago, was introduced to Japan in the 1600s, and subsequently brought to the U.S. by horticulturists John Kelsey and Luther Burbank. Burbank used this stock to breed the Satsuma, the Santa Rosa plum, and countless other varieties that founded the California plum industry. The fruit is large and heart-shaped to conical. The skin color can range from golden yellow, orange-red, or blood red to purple and black. Flesh color usually reflects a variation on the skin color. The taste is slightly acid over sweet. They are best eaten fresh. The flesh is juicy and unlike European plums they are not freestone, two notable exceptions being Satsuma and its improvement, Mariposa. These two varieties also feature less acidity and thus can be dried, a la prune plums.
Japanese plums bloom abundantly early in the season , and thus fruit earlier than European plums . They generally produce heavy crops; if even 1–2% of the blooms set fruit, thinning is required. They tolerate milder winters, that is to say they bloom and set fruit with less chill hours than European plums. The trees tend to be vigorous, rambunctious growers, often exceeding 10 feet a year on standard rootstocks. They are very upright growers with the exception of the Satsuma and Mariposa varieties, which again exhibit a prune plum-like growth habit. Their pollination needs are similar to European plums.Traumatic brain injury accounts for approximately 90% of brain injuries, and is associated with cognitive dysfunction and long-term disability. As a result of domestic incidents, military combat, traffic accidents and sports, TBI can compromise broad aspects of neuronal function. Patients often experience problems in the domains of learning, memory and affective functions that can profoundly influence quality of life. Existing therapeutic strategies for TBI have not been successful in counteracting the heterogeneous TBI pathology nor improving the quality of life of patients. Hence, identifying interventions with broad applicability seems necessary for effective management of TBI.Dietary polyphenols have significant positive effects on brain health via protecting neurons against injury and enhancing neuronal function. Evidence supports the neuromodulatory effects of flavonoid-rich blueberry, particularly in promotion of brain plasticity, and counteracting behavioural deficits. In the United States, demand for blueberries has increased, with 2017 fresh per capita consumption of 1.79 pounds/person. Several reports indicate that blueberry dietary supplementation improves memory, learning and general cognitive function, container raspberries and protects against neuronal injury associated with stroke. Moreover, it has been shown that blueberries possess potent antioxidant capacity through their ability to reduce free radical formation or upregulating endogenous antioxidant defenses. These studies suggest that blueberry supplementation can have the potential to be used to overcome the broad pathology of TBI. Given the lack of information about the effects of blueberry intake immediately after TBI, we have performed studies to assess the effects of blueberry extracts during the acute phase of TBI. Evidence suggests that TBI is characterized by dysfunction in synaptic plasticity, elevated levels of free radicals, plasma membrane dysfunction, which can contribute to the behavioural dysfunction. Oxidative stress is part of the pathology of TBI and compromises neuronal function. In particular, excessive free radical formation leads to accumulation of lipid oxidation by-products such as 4-hydroxynonenal with subsequent impairments in plasma membrane fluidity, receptor signaling across the membrane to deteriorate synaptic plasticity and reduce neuronal excitability. Deficiencies in brain derived neurotrophic factor reduce the brain plasticity necessary to cope with the effects of TBI. BDNF activates cAMP-responsive elementbinding protein , a multifaceted transcriptional regulator involved in synaptic plasticity essential for learning and memory.
BDNF is known to bind to TrkB receptors, leading to activation of Ca2+/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase II , required for synaptic processes involved in behaviour. Several observations indicate that the flavonoids exert action through modulation of signaling pathways to promote synaptic and neuronal function. Accordingly, in the current study, we investigated whether blueberry supplementation would counteract TBI pathology by involving BDNFrelated pathways involved in synaptic plasticity and oxidative stress to influence cognitive behaviours.We employed our standard lateral fluid percussion injury protocol as described earlier . Briefly, 3% isoflurane was provided in a chamber , and then maintained with 2–2.5% isoflurane via nose cone while rats were in a stereotaxic frame. Body temperature was controlled by a heating pad. Under aseptic surgical conditions, a midline skin incision was made to expose the skull. Using a high-speed drill , craniotomy was made 3.0 mm posterior to bregma and 6.0 mm lateral of midline to expose the intact dura. A hollow plastic injury cap was placed over the craniotomy, secured with dental acrylic cement and was later filled with 0.9% saline. When the dental cement hardened, the anesthesia was discontinued and the rat was attached to the FPI device via the head cap. At the first response of hind-limb withdrawal to a paw pinch, rats received a moderate fluid percussion pulse . Upon resumption of spontaneous breathing the head cap was removed and the skin was sutured. Neomycin was applied on the suture and the rats were placed in a heated recovery chamber to be fully ambulatory before being returned to their cages. The sham animals were prepared using the identical surgically procedure but without the fluid pulse.In the present study, we found that BB supplementation can attenuate important aspects of the acute TBI pathology. We report that BB supplementation immediately following TBI mitigates behavioural deficits in spatial learning and memory. BB supplementation counteracted the effects of TBI on proteins associated with the action of BDNF on plasticity and behaviour. In addition, BB supplementation counteracted the increase of the end product of lipid peroxidation, 4-HNE. The results showing that markers of neuronal plasticity and lipid peroxidation change in proportion to memory performance suggest a possible association between these molecular parameters and behaviour. Taken together, the present findings emphasize the beneficial effects of BB supplementation in fostering brain plasticity in the TBI pathology.In agreement with previous reports, we found that TBI impairs spatial learning as evidenced by an increase in latency in the Barnes maze, while BB supplementation decreased latency time to find the escape hole at each training day. We assessed the use of spatial learning strategies in our paradigm to provide a complementary measure of cognitive function less dependent on motor behaviour. Interestingly, we found that BB supplementation appeared to counteract a lost capacity of TBI rats to employ spatial leaning cues. This information together with results of the shorter latencies strongly suggest that BB supplementation protects TBI animals from a loss in spatial learning performance. In this regard, recent functional neuroimaging study in humans has established a connection between BB intake and cognitive function. Further, in the elevated plus maze test, rats exposed to TBI showed a tendency to reduce time spent in the open arms, which encompasses with clinical reports that psychiatric disorders are often observed in TBI patients. TBI-induced behavioural deficits probably stems from the impairments in BDNF-TrkB signaling that has been implicated in various cognitive and affective disorders. Although neuronal cells are the primary locus for learning and memory processing, non-neuronal cell types such as astrocytes and microglia can also contribute to these alterations. Moreover, it known that astrocytes and microglia provide support to synaptic transmission that is fundamental for neuronal function involved in cognitive processing.In the present investigation, we also found that TBI significantly reduced levels of hippocampal BDNF, and that BB dietary supplementation normalized these the levels. Previous report indicated that deficiencies in BDNF signaling is associated with impairments in cognition.