No abstract

The cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.), a typical subtropical plant and a cold-sensitive vegetable, is an annual herbaceous creeping plant of the Cucurbitaceae family and is one of the main summer vegetables in China (http://www.stats.gov.cn/). Cucumbers are prone to enzymatic metabolism after harvest, and nutrients are easily lost at room temperature. Suitable low-temperature storage (LTS) can better preserve the quality of cucumbers after harvest. However, cucumbers are cold-sensitive vegetables that are susceptible to chilling injury (CI) when stored for a long time in normal cold storage or unsuitably low temperature conditions. The symptoms of CI are mainly caused by depressions and loss of color in the epidermis, watery spots on the inner and outer pericarp, a woody texture and browning of the peel, and cracks in the tissue (Nasef, 2018). It has been noted that the occurrence of chilling damage has many adverse effects on fruit and vegetables, the disease resistance and storability decrease and the appearance quality of the fruit and vegetables decreases, which negatively impacts their commodity value. To solve the problem of chilling damage while also

The effects of different storage temperatures (2, 4 and 8 ℃) and their corresponding optimal heat treatment conditions on the quality, physiological and biochemical indexes of Cucumber Fruits during storage were studied by using the quadratic regression orthogonal rotation combination design. The effects of different storage temperatures (2, 4 and 8 ℃) and their corresponding optimal heat treatment conditions on the chilling injury, hardness, weightlessness rate, polyphenol oxidase (PPO), catalase (CAT), peroxidase (POD), H2O2, super oxygen anion free radical (O2-), ASA and GSH were determined. The results showed that heat treatment could inhibit chilling injury, while heat treatment combined with 4 ℃ low temperature storage could effectively inhibit the decline of fruit hardness and weight loss rate, delay the increase of peroxidase (POD) and polyphenol oxidase (PPO) activities, inhibit the increase of H2O2 and superoxide anion free radical O2- and significantly inhibit the browning of cucumber, delay the decline of ascorbic acid and maintain the content of GSH, it was beneficial to adjust the balance of active oxygen system. The results showed that under the storage condition of 4 ℃, the hot water treatment condition of cucumber was 39.4 ℃ and 24.3 min, which could delay the senescence of cucumber fruit and better maintain the quality of cucumber fruit.