Carolyn,
I hope you will enjoy your own Sgt. Peppers tomatoes this season
I contacted Tollie to ask about antho in the leaves of Sgt Peppers and he sent me the following:
(Google Docs to the rescue)
Anthocyanins in tomato fruits and plants
oregonstate.edu/ua/ncs/archives/2012/jan/purple-tomato-debuts-%E2%80%98indigo-rose%E2%80%99
Jim Myers, a professor in the OSU horticulture department said:
“Indigo Rose's genesis began in the 1960s, when two breeders – one from Bulgaria and the other from the United States – first crossed-cultivated tomatoes with wild species from Chile and the Galapagos Islands, Myers said. Some wild tomato species have anthocyanins in their fruit, and until now, tomatoes grown in home gardens have had the beneficial pigment only in their leaves and stems, which are inedible.”
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academic.oup.com/jhered/article/94/6/449/2187396/Characterization-and-Inheritance-of-the
Tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum) accession LA1996 with the Anthocyanin fruit (Aft) gene has dark green foliage, elevated anthocyanin expression in the hypocotyls of seedlings, and anthocyanin in the skin and outer pericarp tissues of the fruit.
Vegetative tissues of Aft tomato plants are distinctive. Leaves are darker green and stems contain visibly more purple speckling than do wild-type plants.
Normal tomato genotypes routinely contain anthocyanin in the vegetative parts of the plants but not in the fruit.
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He also stated that he had personally observed anthocyanin expressed in the leaves and stems of sprouts, seedlings and transplants although the purple coloring seems to disappear in mature plants, it is retained in the stems.
One more exciting thing he said was that he believes that anthocyanin is protective for plants going into cold weather at the end of the season!
Linda