Accelerated aging is known to reduce seed viability and vigor in many crop species. This study was undertaken to evaluate the effect of accelerated aging on germination potential, germination percentage, electric conductivity, acid value and peroxide value. Compared with common peanut, high oleic acid peanut were more beneficial to health and can significantly improve the storability of seed. Eight high oleic acid (range of oleic acid content: 74.95%-80.6%) and two common varieties were used in this experiment. Six treatments were contained, natural aging of kernels, natural ageing of pods, accelerated aging was achieved by incubating seed at 40°C and 100% relative humidity in a closed chamber for 4, 6, and 8 days. The results showed that: the changes of germination potential and germination percentage of natural aging were not significant for high oleic acid peanuts, smaller than that of the common varieties. No matter artificial aging or natural aging treatment, compared with non-aging treatment, electric conductivity gradually increased, but high oleic acid varieties remained at low levels. The acid value of each variety increased gradually with the aging time, comparison between aging treatments, the difference between high oleic acid varieties was not significant, not the same with the common varieties. The peroxide value of 8 high oleic acid varieties was zero under each aging treatment, but the peroxide value of two common varieties increased with the aging time. The variation rules of all indicators of artificial aging for 4 days and 6 days were the same with the two natural aging treatments. So artificial aging for 4 days and 6 days can be used for high oleic acid aging test, replace natural aging, which not only shortens the test time but also ensuring the best effect.

High oleic peanut food products have proved to have better keeping quality and several health benefits. Most of the high oleic acid peanut cultivars thus far released were bred through hybridization. Breeding through mutagenesis directly provides a possibility of keeping the main agronomic characteristics from the parental cultivars/lines unchanged in the new cultivars, which is of significance to their use in commercial production. The aim of the present study was to convert Fuhua 12, a normal oleic Spanish peanut cultivar, into a high oleic version through EMS (ethyl methane sulfonate) mutagenesis. The effect of the first round of EMS treatment of Fuhua 12 on oleic acid content was limited. However, after the second round of EMS treatment, we were able to identity a high oleic plant through near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) and further studies by gas chromatography and sequence comparison of the mutated type and wild type FAD2A/FAD2B genes. The mutant had the same mutations in FAD2A and FAD2B as UF435. A G448A substitution in FAD2A and an A insertion (441_442insA) in FAD2B together contribute to the high oleic phenotype of the mutant. In this study, Fuhua 12 was successfully converted into a high oleic version without changing most of the agronomic characters, demonstrating the utility of a two-step chemical mutagen treatment protocol in inducing useful mutations in the cultivated peanut. The novel method may expedite genetics and breeding studies in the cultivated peanut, and is of reference to other polyploid plant species.