EFFECT OF UV IRRADIATION ON CONTENT OF FLAVONOIDS IN SPINACH LEAVES

Recently, it has been found that flavonoids in agricultural products have various physiological functions, such as antioxidaive (Shahidi et al., 1992) or antitumor activity, and a UV protective effect etc. Therefore, people are concerned with their consumption through the diet for health maintenance and improvement. Flavonoids function in plants as a defense filter of ultraviolet radiation (Lois, 1994). We have examined flavonoid content in response to UV to clarify the relationship between their content in vegetables and UV radiation and to acquire the necessary information about the growth conditions for maintenance of their content or increasing it.