METHYL JASMONATE AND METHYL SALICYLATE AFFECT DIFFERENTIALLY THE POSTHARVEST RIPENING PROCESS OF ‘PRIMULAT’ SWEET CHERRY

The ‘Primulat’ cherry tree (Prunus avium L.) is a vigorous, precocious cultivar and is considered as an early-season fruit.
Of good size for the time of maturity, ‘Primulat’ cherry has a luminous purple color with a gustatory quality that is very appreciated.
The objective of this work was to study the effect of postharvest treatments by vapours of methyl jasmonate (MeJA) or methyl salicylate (MeSA) at 1 mM on quality attributes during 14 days of storage at 2°C on ‘Primulat’ sweet cherry.
Fruits were exposed to vapours for 16 h at 20°C in darkness.
Control cherries showed the typical changes in quality traits such as softening, acidity and weight loss, and low variation in colour changes.
Those fruit treated with MeSA showed reduction in the above parameters, such as higher firmness and titratable acidity.
In contrast, MeJA induced an acceleration of the ripening process since lower firmness and total acidity were found in treated compared with control fruit, although weight losses remained lower than the control.
These effects could be attributed to respiration rate, since fruit treated with MeSA showed lower respiration rate than controls, while those fruit treated with MeJA exhibited higher rates of respiration.

V International Conference Postharvest Unlimited

S. Castillo, J.M. Valverde, F. Guillén, P.J. Zapata, H.M. Díaz-Mula, D. Valero, D. Martínez-Romero, M. Serrano

salicylate, jasmonate, ethylene, respiration rate, firmness, colour, acidity, quality, Prunus avium

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2015.1079.72