Morus (plant)

Mulberry
Ripe mulberry on tree
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Plantae Phylum: Magnoliophyta Class: Magnoliopsida Order: Rosales Family: Moraceae Genus: Morus L.
Species
See text.

Mulberry is the common name for any of the deciduous trees comprising the genus Morus of the flowering plant family Moraceae, characterized by simple, alternate leaves, a milky sap, and a small, edible multiple fruit. The term also is used for the sweet-sour, blackberry-like fruit of these trees. Mulberries are native to warm, temperate, and subtropical regions of Asia, Africa, and the Americas, with the majority of the species native to Asia.

While the Morus genus comprises the "true mulberries," there are also trees in other genera that utilize the name mulberry, including the paper mulberry, Broussonetia papyrifera.

sweet with a good flavor in several species; sweet-sour, unripe inedibly sour (Herbst 2001). eaten raw, jams, jellies, desserts, mulberry wine (Herbst 2001).

wood used for furniture, fence posts, barrels, etc.

silkworm leaves only food of the domesticated silkworm, which particularly favors the white mulberry, M. alba.

Description

The Moraceae family is commonly known as the mulberry or fig family. This family of flowering plants comprises about 40 genera and over 1000 species of plants widespread in tropical and subtropical regions, less common in temperate climates. The only synapomorphy (a derived character shared by terminal groups and inherited from their most recent common ancestor, but lacking in its ancestor) within Moraceae is presence of lactifers and milky sap in all parenchymatous tissues. However, generally useful field characters include 2 carpels, sometimes with 1 reduced, compound inconspicuous flowers, and compound fruits (Judd et al. 2008). Included are well-known plants such as the fig, banyan, breadfruit, mulberry, and osage-orange. The 'flowers' of Moraceae are often pseudanthia (reduced inflorescences).

The Morus genus comprises about ten to sixteen species. Mulberries are fast-growing when young, but soon become slow-growing and rarely exceed 10-15 meters tall. The leaves are alternately arranged, simple, often lobed, more often lobed on juvenile shoots than on mature trees, and serrated on the margin. The fruit is a multiple fruit, two to three centimeters long. It resembles blackberries somewhat in size and shape. The fruits begin as white or green to pale yellow with pink edges. They are red when ripening. A fully ripened mulberry is dark purple to black, edible, and sweet with a good flavor in several species.

Species

The taxonomy of Morus is complex and disputed. Over 150 species names have been published, but only 10-16 are generally cited as being accepted, though diverse sources cite different selections of accepted names. The classification also is complicated by widespread hybridization, with the hybrids being fertile.

The following species are generally accepted:

Morus alba (White Mulberry; eastern Asia) Morus australis (Chinese Mulberry; southeastern Asia) Morus celtidifolia (Mexico) Morus insignis (South America)

Morus mesozygia (African Mulberry; southern and central Africa) Morus microphylla (Texas Mulberry; south central North America: Texas, Mexico) Morus nigra (Black Mulberry; southwest Asia) Morus rubra (Red Mulberry; eastern North America)

The following, all from eastern and southern Asia, are additionally accepted by one or more taxonomic lists or studies; synonymy as given by other lists or studies is indicated in brackets:

Morus atropurpurea Morus bombycis (M. australis) Morus cathayana Morus indica (M. alba) Morus japonica (M. alba) Morus kagayamae (M. australis) Morus laevigata (M. alba var. laevigata, M. macroura) Morus latifolia (M. alba) Morus liboensis

Morus macroura (M. alba var. laevigata) Morus mongolica (M. alba var. mongolica) Morus multicaulis (M. alba) Morus notabilis Morus rotundiloba Morus serrata (Himalayan Mulberry; M. alba var. serrata) Morus tillaefolia Morus trilobata (M. australis var. trilobata) Morus wittiorum

Uses

The ripe fruit is edible and is widely used in jams, jellies, pies, tarts, wines, and cordials. The three main varieties used are black, red, and white (Herbst 2001). Unripe berries are inedibly sour, but when fully ripe the flavor has been described as sweet-sour, albeit somewhat bland (Herbst 2001). The fruit of the black mulberry, native to southwest Asia, and the red mulberry, native to eastern North America, have the strongest flavor. The fruit of the white mulberry, an east Asian species which is extensively naturalized in urban regions of eastern North America, has a different flavor, sometimes characterized as insipid.

Black, red, and white mulberry are widespread in Northern India, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Pakistan, Iran, and Afghanistan, where the tree and the fruit are known by the Persian-derived names Toot (mulberry) or Shahtoot (King's or "Superior" mulberry). Jams and sherbets are often made from the fruit in this region. Black mulberry was imported to Britain in the 17th century in the hope that it would be useful in the cultivation of silkworms. It was much used in folk medicine, especially in the treatment of ringworm.

The mature fruit contains significant amounts of resveratrol. Unripe fruit and green parts of the plant have a white sap that is intoxicating and mildly hallucinogenic.

The wood of mulberries is also used for such purposes as fence posts, barrels, and furniture.

Mulberry leaves, particularly those of the white mulberry, are ecologically important as the sole food source of the domesticated silkworm (Bombyx mori (Latin: "silkworm of the mulberry tree"), the pupa/cocoon of which is used to make silk. The caterpillars feed on leaves of mulberry trees, with the preferred food being the white mulberry. Adults in the Bombycidae family have reduced mouth parts and do not feed.

Other Lepidoptera larvae also sometimes feed on the plant including common emerald, lime hawk-moth, and the sycamore.

Mulberries can be grown from seed, and this is often advised as seedling-grown trees are generally of better shape and health. But they are most often planted from large cuttings, which take root readily.

Anthocyanins from mulberry fruits

Anthocyanins are edible, water-soluble vacuolar pigments that belong to a class of molecules called flavonoids and that may appear red, purple, orange, blue or black, according to pH. Anthocyanins hold potential use for health benefits (Gross 2007) and as natural food colorants. As the safety of synthetic pigments is doubted and in the wake of increasing demand for natural food colorants, their significance in food industry is increasing. In addition to yielding attractive colors, they are water-soluble and thus are easily incorporated into aqueous food systems.

Anthocyanins also possess an antioxidant property and are being investigated for antineoplastic, radiation-protective, vasotonic, vasoprotective, anti-inflammatory, chemopreventive and hepato-protective properties.

Research on 31 cultivars of mulberry yielded a total anthocyanin level, calculated as cyanidin 3-glucoside, ranging from 147.68 to 2725.46 mg/L juice (Liu et al. 2004). The researchers also reported a potentially cheap and effective industiral methods to extract and purifying the anthocyanins using macroporous resins. Total sugars, total acids, and vitamins remained intact in the residual juice after removal of anthocyanins and that the residual juice could be fermented in order to produce products such as juice, wine, and sauce.

The genera Morus has been domesticated over thousands of years and constantly been subjected to heterosis breeding (mainly for improving leaf yield). By such means, it is possible to develop cultivars suitable for berry production, thus offering possible industrial use of mulberry as a source of anthocyanins for functional foods or food colorants that could enhance the overall profitability of sericulture.

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• EROWID. 2008. [http://www.erowid.org/herbs/mulberry/mulberry_info2.shtml References and mentions

of the hallucinogenic properties of mulberry]. EROWID. Retrieved May 8, 2008.

.

• Herbst, S. T. 2001. The New Food Lover's Companion: Comprehensive Definitions of Nearly 6,000 Food, Drink, and Culinary Terms. Barron's Cooking Guide. Hauppauge, NY: Barron's Educational Series. ISBN 0764112589.

• Judd, Walter S.; Campbell, Christopher S.; Kellogg, Elizabeth A.; Stevens, Peter F. & Donoghue, Michael J. (2008): Plant Systematics: A Phylogenetic Approach. Sinauer Associates, Inc. Sunderland, MA.

• Liu, X., G. Xiao, W. Chen, Y. Xu, and J. Wu 2004. [

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1082888 Quantification and purification of Mulberry anthocyanins with macroporous resins]. J Biomed Biotechnol. 2004(5): 326–331. Retrieved May 8, 2008.

• Zhao Weiguo, Pan Yile, Zhang Zhifang Jia Shihai, Miao Xuexia & Huang Yongping. 2005. Phylogeny of the genus Morus. African Journal of Biotechnology 4 (6): 563-569 Online (pdf file)

Herbst 2001

External links

• Flora of China: Morus
• Flora of North America: Morus
• University of Melbourne: Sorting Morus names
• Museum of Cape Town: Moraceae
• Information on mulberry, silkworms and sericulture

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