What is it exactly that gives certain plants their red color?
- Thread starter jaboo
- Start date
Depends on the plant
There are four primary plant pigment types
1. Chlorophylls - these are the most common pigments which give green colour to plants and algae. They also capture light in a certain spectrum for photosynthetic reactions
2. Carotenoids - these are yellow, orange or red pigments. Carotene [orange] is seen in carrots, lutein in yellow fruits and vegetables and lycopene in tomatoes. They capture UV spectrum which chlorophylls cannot.
3. Anthocyanins - are water soluble and range from blue to red. They are present, for example, in berries and red wines and are powerful antioxidants. They are also called flavonoids.
4. Betalains - these are red and yellow indole derivatives found mostly in cactus although you may be more familiar with them in beets, where they are responsible for the rich red colour. As you know, betalains also dissolve in water [which you may discover by boiling beets]. Like flavonoids they are also powerful antioxidants.
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I can not directly answer your question. I can only note that anything in white light that strongly absorbs green wave lengths will appear red at least to humans as there is a red/green axis in our color processing system of the brain (in the region called V4, if memory serves me, but if not that it is V5).