Physiological changes in sweet cherry fruit in response to physical damage

Consumers demand high-quality fruit, yet quality characteristics decrease during rough postharvest handling practices such as mechanical injuries, moisture loss, and so on.
This study aimed to identify the physiological changes due to physical damage effect on the quality characteristic in sweet cherry (Prunus avium L.) ‘Benishuho’. The experiment comprised of five treatments of a combination of fruit dropping before storage and compression during the storage.
The fruits were dropped from 100-cm height before storage.
The compression weight was 200 g per 6 fruits in a chamber during the storage.
A batch of fruits selected for uniformity were used for each treatment and kept at 20°C and 80±3% RH in a chamber.
The physiological and appearance changes of fruits were measured daily during the storage period.
The elevated ethylene production level (0.36-0.47 nL ethylene g^-1 h^-1) was observed particularly in the dropped fruits.
The compression at a lateral side of fruits enhanced the ethylene production during the storage and increased the damaged area on the surface of the skin.
The damage and decayed areas increased significantly, especially in dropped samples and reached its peak level six days after a storage period.
The respiration rate was also slightly higher (13.8-16.8 nL CO₂ g^-1 h^-1) in the dropped fruits by ethylene production.
On the other hand, flesh color values were not significantly changed by the treatment.
Similarly, soluble solid (SSC) were also not considerably altered, maintained almost unchanged.
However, acidity level % exhibited a gradual increase.
The physical damage before storage triggered the ethylene production during storage and increased the decay area.

VIII International Cherry Symposium

A.G. Sediqi, S. Kramchote, H. Itamura, T. Esumi

dropping damage, compressing, ethylene, respiration, decay

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2019.1235.69