Know More About Your Acai Berry

"Acai Berry" the most renown fruit today.

If you don't have some idea about this mystical fruit, read this:

The fruit, a small, round, black-purple drupe about 1 inch (25 mm) in diameter, similar in appearance and size to a grape but with less pulp, is produced in branched panicles of 700 to 900 fruits. Two crops of fruit are produced each year. The fruit has a single large seed about 0.25–0.40 inches (7–10 mm) in diameter. The exocarp of the ripe fruits is a deep purple color, or green, depending on the kind of açaí and its maturity. The mesocarp is pulpy and thin, with a consistent thickness of 1 mm or less. It surrounds the voluminous and hard endocarp which contains a seed with a diminutive embryo and abundant endosperm.The seed makes up about 80% of the fruit.

A comparative analysis reported that açaí had intermediate antioxidant potency among a variety of frozen juice pulps tested. Among the eleven fruits pulps tested, açaí had the fifth-most anti-oxidant potency, with a TEAC (Trolox equivalent antioxidant activity) score of 6.9 mmol g (while the highest scoring domestic fruit, acerola, scored 53.2 mmol g).

A powdered preparation of freeze-dried açaí fruit pulp and skin was shown to contain anthocyanins (3.19 mg/g), antioxidant capacity of açaí is only about 10%. The powdered preparation was also reported to contain twelve flavonoid-like compounds, including homoorientin, orientin, taxifolin, deoxyhexose, isovitexin, scoparin, as well as proanthocyanidins (12.89 mg/g), and low levels of resveratrol (1.1 μg/g).

In a study of different açaí varieties for their antioxidant capacity, a white species displayed no antioxidant activity against different oxygen radicals, whereas the purple variety most often used commercially was excellent against peroxyl radicals, good against peroxynitrite and poor against hydroxyl radicals.

Freeze-dried açaí powder was found to have high antioxidant activity against superoxide (1614 units/g) and peroxyl radicals (1027 μmol TE/g) and milder activity for peroxynitrite and hydroxyl radicals. The powder was reported to inhibit hydrogen peroxide-induced oxidation in neutrophils, and to have a slight stimulatory effect on nitric oxide production by lipopolysaccharide-stimulated macrophages in vitro.

Extracts of açaí seeds were reported to have antioxidant capacity against peroxyl radicals, similar to the capacity of the pulp, with higher antioxidant capacity against peroxynitrite and hydroxyl radicals.

I hope you understand now why this fruit are so popular today...