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    Comprehensive Assessment of the Dynamics of Banana Chilling Injury by Advanced Optical Techniques
    (Basel : MDPI, 2021) Herppich, Werner B.; Zsom, Tamás
    Green‐ripe banana fruit are sensitive to chilling injury (CI) and, thus, prone to postharvest quality losses. Early detection of CI facilitates quality maintenance and extends shelf life. CI affects all metabolic levels, with membranes and, consequently, photosynthesis being primary targets. Optical techniques such as chlorophyll a fluorescence analysis (CFA) and spectroscopy are promising tools to evaluate CI effects in photosynthetically active produce. Results obtained on bananas are, however, largely equivocal. This results from the lack of a rigorous evaluation of chilling impacts on the various aspects of photosynthesis. Continuous and modulated CFA and imaging (CFI), and VIS remission spectroscopy (VRS) were concomitantly applied to noninvasively and comprehensively monitor photosynthetically relevant effects of low temperatures (5 °C, 10 °C, 11.5 °C and 13 °C). Detailed analyses of chilling‐related variations in photosynthetic activity and photoprotection, and in contents of relevant pigments in green‐ripe bananas, helped to better understand the physiological changes occurring during CI, highlighting that distinct CFA and VRS parameters comprehensively reflect various effects of chilling on fruit photosynthesis. They revealed why not all CFA parameters can be applied meaningfully for early detection of chilling effects. This study provides relevant requisites for improving CI monitoring and prediction.
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    Optimization of short-term hot-water treatment of apples for fruit salad production by non-invasive chlorophyll-fluorescence imaging
    (Basel : MDPI AG, 2020) Herppich, Werner B.; Maggioni, Marco; Huyskens-Keil, Susanne; Kabelitz, Tina; Hassenberg, Karin
    For fresh ]cut salad production, hot-water treatment (HWT) needs optimization in terms of temperature and duration to guarantee a gentle and non-stressing processing to fully retain product quality besides an effective sanitation. One major initial target of heat treatment is photosynthesis, making it a suitable and sensitive marker for HWT effects. Chlorophyll fluorescence imaging (CFI) is a rapid and non ]invasive tool to evaluate respective plant responses. Following practical applications in fruit salad production, apples of colored and of green ]ripe cultivars ( eBraeburn f, eFuji f, eGreenstar f, eGranny Smith f), obtained from a local fruit salad producer, were hot ]water treated from 44 to 70 °C for 30 to 300 s. One day after HWT and after 7 days of storage at 4 °C, CFI and remission spectroscopy were applied to evaluating temperature effects on photosynthetic activity, on contents of fruit pigments (chlorophylls, anthocyanins), and on various relevant quality parameters of intact apples. In eBraeburn f apples, short ]term HWT at °C for 30 to 120 s avoided any heat injuries and quality losses. The samples of the other three cultivars turned out to be less sensitive and may be short-term heat-treated at temperatures of up to 60 °C for the same time. CFI proved to be a rapid, sensitive, and effective tool for process optimization of apples, closely reflecting the cultivar-or batch-specificity of heat effects on produce photosynthesis. © 2020 by the authors.