3^rd European Food Chemistry and Drug Safety Congress

Biography

Biography: Jamal Ayour

Abstract

The softening of apricot fruit results from significant changes in the cell wall which occurs during maturation. These modifications are essentially the result of enzyme activity modifying the cell walls composition and are involved in the detachment of the cell wall, which promotes tissue extension and growth. In this work, the activities of important pectinolytic enzymes involved in the degradation of the cell wall, and consequently the loss of firmness, namely pectin methylesterase (PME), polygalacturonase (PG) and β-Galactosidase (β-Gal), were monitored during two ripening stages (commercial and consumption) in 10 apricot clones. The overall results suggested that the maturation of the apricots was coordinated by the three pectinolytic enzyme activities, since PME, PG and β-Gal activities increased during ripening while fruit flesh firmness decreased. In addition, the results showed that apricot softening was more controlled by β-galactosidase and PME. There were large effects of clone, ripening stage and tissue zone on the firmness and enzymatic activities of apricots. For most clones, the firmness levels were higher in peduncle zone, followed by the equatorial zone and at last the pistil zone. Contrariwise, the enzymatic activities were found important especially in pistil zone followed by the equatorial and peduncle zones. The enzymatic activity evolution observed are discussed in relation to published information about ripening of apricots and to results reported using other species.