Ah, the beauty of Yosemite
National Park in
November. The leaf colors are incredible shades of gold, magenta, and
purple. Rising in stark contrast from the valley floor are the sheer
granite walls of El Capitan, Glacier Point, Half Dome, Yosemite, and Bridalveil Falls.
Visiting Yosemite now is
just as amazing as it was a number of years ago when I made annual treks with
groups of students to study the flora and fauna. Lately, my view of
Yosemite has been from 35,000 feet while flying westward toward San Francisco. The
sheer awesomeness of Yosemite is revealed
every time I fly over it and it s natural power truly boggles the mind and
overwhelms the senses.
However on my recent trip as I admired the leaf colors up
close, I was thinking of what the fall colors mean in terms of human health. I
learned from Dr. Jacques Masqulier, the distinguished professor emeritus now
retired from the University
of Bordeaux , that the
fall colors came from antioxidants in the leaves and barks of trees. During
spring and summer, the brilliant green of chlorophyll, which supports energy
for growth, obscures these antioxidants. As the season winds down, Chlorophyll
bleaches out and the brilliant antioxidant pigments are revealed.
Magenta and purple come from anthocyanins while yellow
and golden colors come from carotenoids and flavons, a relative of
anthocyanins. Much of the year pro-anthocyanidins are colorless and only
display their pigments in the absence of chlorophyll and as the leaf pH
changes. What Dr. Masquelier and other scientist have shown is that these
antioxidant pigments not only protect leaves and bark, they perform similar functions
in us. Dr. Masquelier had discovered this in the 1940’s when he was a
doctoral student and his life’s work was dedicated to finding out how these
pigments function in our bodies.
