Document Type : Research Article
Authors
Shahed University
Abstract
Introduction: There are two types of Japanese persimmon (Diospyros kaki Thunb.), astringent and non-astringent, based on the degree of astringent taste at maturity state. Fruits of either type are strongly astringent when small and immature, but non-astringent type loses its astringency during development on the tree, still with firm flesh. However, the astringent type keeps its astringency and is inedible even when fully colored. It loses its astringency when becomes over-ripe with extremely soft flesh. At this stage, the fruits are usually over ripe with poor quality. Astringency in persimmon is caused by soluble tannins present in the fruit flesh. One mechanism useful in artificial removal of astringency from persimmon fruit is condensation or polymerization of soluble tannins into insoluble non-astringent forms, by acetaldehyde, which is being produced in the fruit flesh during different treatments. Acetaldehyde accumulates in the fruit flesh during its exposure to ethanol vapor or high level of carbon dioxide (CO2) gas, Hence, constant temperature and short duration (CTSD) is the preferred method of CO2 treatment used to remove astringency of persimmon fruit. It involves holding the fruits in ≥95% carbon dioxide atmosphere for a short duration at constant temperature of 20-30°C then transferring to normal atmosphere. However using CO2 treatment as gas form is expensive and needs special equipment. However, solid CO2 (dry ice) is easily available in Iran with low price. It release CO2 gas and can be used for removing astringency in persimmon fruit. The response of persimmon to de-astringent treatment depends on the cultivar. In this study two persimmon cultivars namely: ”Karaj” and ”Japanese” were harvested at maturity (full coloring) stage and treated with dry ice and ethanol vapor to remove astringency and the quality of treated fruits were evaluated.
Materials and methods: Astringent persimmon fruits cvs ‘Karaj’ and ‘Japanese’ were harvested at maturity stage and transported immediately to the Department of Horticulture Science, University of Shahed and treated with either ethanol or dry ice. Both ethanol and dry ice treatmenttreatments were applied in low-density polyethylene bags with 0.05 mm thickness and polyethylene container with 3 mm thickness. In the polyethylene container, dry ice was applied at amounts of 3, 5 and 7% per kilograms of fruit and in the polyethylene bags dry ice was applied at amount of 0.16, 0.25 and 0.33 per kilogerams of fruits. For ethanol treatment, in both polyethylene bag and polyethylene container, 10 ml of 36% ethanol per kilogram of fruit was sprayed. Thereafter, bags and containers were sealed completely and kept for 48 hours at 25°C and 80% RH. After removing from the closed bags and containers, fruits were held in air at 25°C, 80% RH for completing astringency removing. After astringency removal treatmenttreatments, soluble tannin contents, astringent taste degree, fruit firmness, total soluble solid and ascorbic acid content were measured. The content of soluble tannin was determined by Folin-Denis method and the degree of astringency was determined by panel test. The experiments were conducted in a completely randomized design (CRD) and analysis of variance (ANOVA) was performed and the means were compared using LSD Test.
Results and discussion: After performing the astringency removal treatment, fruits containing less than 1000 ppm of soluble tannin on a fresh weight basis showed no astringency. Results presented here showed that, dry ice treatment, especially at higher concentrations such as 7% in both cultivars, causes removal of astringency and decreases soluble tannin contents below the threshold of 1000 ppm, but ethanol treatment was effective only in Karaj persimmon for the removal of astringency. Similarly, it was indicated that CO2 treatment removed the astringency more easily in some Chinese cultivars than the ethanol treatment. The response of persimmon cv. Karaj was similar to a leading cultivar Hiratanenashi in Japan, for astringency removal by both CO2 and ethanol treatments, while, according to this results, Japanese cultivar had not shown suitable response to ethanol, while it successfully responded to dry ice treatment.
Treatments to remove astringency of persimmon fruit often cause fruit softening. Astringency removal treatment induced ethylene production in persimmon which causes to the fruits softening. In this study, the firmness of both cultivars decreased significantly after treatments, however, the average of flesh firmness was significantly higher after dry ice than after ethanol treatments.
Total soluble solid contents under the astringency removal treatments in both cultivars reduced significantly. This reduction is due to the removing of soluble tannins responsible for fruit astringency, since they are included in SSC measurements when not polymerized. Moreover, the results showed that ascorbic acid content is not affected by astringency removal treatments.
Conclusions: The results presented here showed that removing astringency from persimmon cvs. Karaj and Japanese were achieved by postharvest application of dry ice in the poly ethylene container. Results also showed that dry ice was more effective than ethanol in astringency removal and retained higher quality of fruit. Dry ice is available treatment in Iran and it can be commercially used for removing astringency of Iranian persimmon.
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