Report: Comparison of qualitative, quantitative analysis and antioxidant potential between wild and cultivated Borago officinalis leaves from palestine.

Borago officinalis plant is an important plant of high medicinal and nutritional values. This study designed to evaluate antioxidant activity, screen the existence of phytogenic chemical compounds and to determine the total flavonoid and phenol contents of wild and cultivated Borago officinalis. Total flavonoid contents of the wild and cultivated Borago officinalis were determined by using rutin reference standard method and total phenols determined by using Folin Ciocalteu's method while antioxidant activity evaluated by using 2, 2-diphenyl-1-picryl-hydrazyl-hydrate assay. Phytochemical analyses indicated the presence of carbohydrate, phenols, flavonoids, phytosteroids tannins and volatile oil. The total flavonoid content of the methanolic extract from the wild borage plant was 22.4mg RU/g this value was reduced to 13.1mg RU/g for the cultivated methanolic extract as well as the total phenols contents was dropped from 5.21mg GA/g to 2.37mg GA/g methanolic extracts. Total tannins content of the wild growing borage plant was 13.7mg GA/g methanolic extract. This value was higher in the cultivated borage with 21.33mg GA/g methanolic extract. The wild leaves extract had IC50 =6.3µg/mL for wild leaves extract was closer to IC50 value of Trolox (standard reference with high antioxidant activity), while the cultivated leaves extract had higher IC50= 8.7µg/mL which mean lower antioxidant activity than the wild growing one. The data of this study showed that the extracts of Borago officinalis possess antioxidant and free radical scavenging activities. Variation was clear between wild and cultivated species, these findings propose that such plant extract could have a wide range of applications in both food and pharmaceutical industries. Therefore, more research is necessary to investigate different cultural practices on the efficiency of borage plant.

Molecular characterization of three common olive (Olea europaea L.) cultivars in Palestine, using simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers.

Eight accessions of olive trees from three common varieties in Palestine, Nabali Baladi, Nabali Mohassan and Surri, were genetically evaluated using five simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers. A total of 17 alleles from 5 loci were observed in which 15 (88.2%) were polymorphic and 2 (11.8%) were monomorphic. An average of 3.4 alleles per locus was found ranging from 2.0 alleles with the primers GAPU-103 and DCA-9 to 5.0 alleles with U9932 and DCA-16. The smallest amplicon size observed was 50 bp with the primer DCA-16, whereas the largest one (450 bp) with the primer U9932. Cluster analysis with the unweighted pair group method with arithmetic average (UPGMA) showed three clusters: a cluster with four accessions from the 'Nabali Baladi' cultivar, another cluster with three accessions that represents the 'Nabali Mohassen' cultivar and finally the 'Surri' cultivar. The similarity coefficient for the eight olive tree samples ranged from a maximum of 100% between two accessions from Nabali Baladi and also in two other samples from Nabali Mohassan, to a minimum similarity coefficient (0.315) between the Surri and two Nabali Baladi accessions. The results in this investigation clearly highlight the genetic dissimilarity between the three main olive cultivars that have been misidentified and mixed up in the past, based on conventional morphological characters.