The name guava includes several tropical plants of the myrtle family that yield delicious fruits The common guava (P guajava) is a small, evergreen bush with fragrant, white fowers on solitary axillary stalks The fruits are larger than a hen’s egg, roundish or pear-shaped, smooth and yellow The rind is thin and brittle; the pulp is frm, aromatic, sweet and full of bony seeds The common guava and the cattley or strawberry guava are grown extensively in Florida and southern California The mara gamba (P pygmaeum) is a dwarf species of Brazil with fruits no larger than gooseberries The part used is the fruit.
Composition
Guava is known to contain lycopene Xanthene dyes (i e , phloxine B and uranine or phloxine B alone) isolated from guava fruits are phototoxic to tephritid fruit fies infesting guava fruits * Sixteen carotenoids were isolated from the fesh of Brazilian red guavas (Psidium guajava L ) The carotenoids were identifed as phytofuene, (all-E)-, (9Z)-, (13Z)-, and (15Z)-beta-carotene, (all-E)-gamma-carotene, (all-E)-, (9Z)-, (13Z)-, and (15Z)-lycopene, (all-E, 3R)-beta-cryptoxanthin, (all-E, 3R)-rubixanthin, (all- E, 3S,5R,8S)-cryptofavin, (all-E, 3R,3?R, 6?R)-lutein, (all-E, 3S,5R,6R,3?S,5?R,8?R)-, and (all-E, 3S,5R,6R,3?S, 5?R,8?S)-neochrome Thirteen of the carotenoids identifed are reported as guava carotenoids for the frst time ?.
Taste threshold values
Taste characteristics at 2%: fruity, tropical, apricot, peach and astringent.
