Ethylene promotes fruit ripening, including softening. The fruit of melting-flesh peach (Prunus persica (L). Batsch) cultivar 'Akatsuki' produces increasing levels of ethylene, and the flesh firmness softens rapidly during the ripening stage. On the other hand, the fruit of stony hard peach cultivars 'Yumyeong', 'Odoroki', and 'Manami' does not soften and produces little ethylene during fruit r...

The mechanism by which seal-packaging individual fruit in high density polyethylene film delays deterioration was investigated with lemon (Citrus limon [L.] Burm. f. cv Eureka) and bell pepper (Capsicum annuum L. cv Maor) fruits. Seal-packaging effects were due to the water-saturated atmosphere in the sealed enclosure around the fruit. Softening of fruit was highly correlated with declining wat...

Cell wall disassembly in softening fruits is a complex process involving the cumulative action of many families of wall-modifying proteins on interconnected polysaccharide matrices. One strategy to elucidate the in vivo substrates of specific enzymes and their relative importance and contribution to wall modification is to suppress their expression in transgenic fruit. It has been reported prev...

Softening characteristics were investigated in three types of pear fruit, namely, European pear 'La France', Chinese pear 'Yali', and Japanese pear 'Nijisseiki'. 'La France' fruit softened dramatically and developed a melting texture during ripening, while 'Yali' fruit with and without propylene treatment showed no change in flesh firmness and texture during ripening. Non-treated 'Nijisseiki' d...

BACKGROUND Fruit ripening and softening are key traits that have an effect on food supply, fruit nutritional value and consequently, human health. Since ethylene induces ripening of climacteric fruit, it is one of the main targets to control fruit over ripening that leads to fruit softening and deterioration. The characterization of the ethylene pathway in Arabidopsis and tomato identified key ...

Using a novel pressure membrane (PM) apparatus for the extraction of apoplastic fluid from field-grown grape (Vitis vinifera L.) berries, our hypothesis that significant apoplast solutes accumulate at the beginning of the ripening process (i.e. veraison), and that this accumulation might contribute to progressive berry softening due to a progressive loss of mesocarp cell turgor pressure (P) was...

The physiological effects of reduced ethylene synthesis in a transgenic tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum) line expressing 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylic acid (ACC) deaminase enzyme have been examined. Fruit from the transgenic line 5673 ripen significantly slower than control fruit when removed from the vine early in ripening. In contrast, fruit that remain attached to the plants ripen much mo...

As apples ripen they begin to produce large amounts of the ripening hormone, ethylene. Ethylene stimulates fruit softening and the formation of an abscission zone in the stem. Ethylene stimulates the production of enzymes (cellulase and polyglacturonase) that break down the cell walls and the glue that holds cell walls together in the abscission zone of the stem, leaving the fruit connected to ...