Metabolome Analysis of Banana (Musa acuminata) Treated With Chitosan Coating and Low Temperature Reveals Different Mechanisms Modulating Delayed Ripening

Abstract

Banana (Musa acuminata) is one of the most important crop plants consumed in many countries. However, the commercial value decreases during storage and transportation. To maintain fruit quality, postharvest technologies have been developed. Storage at low temperature is a common method to prolong the shelf life of food products, especially during transportation and distribution. Another emerging approach is the use of chitosan biopolymer as an edible coating, which can extend the shelf life of fruit by preventing moisture and aroma loss, and inhibiting oxygen penetration into the plant tissue. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry metabolite profiling of the banana ripening process was performed to clarify the global metabolism changes in banana after chitosan coating or storage at low temperature. Both postharvest treatments were effective in delaying banana ripening. Interestingly, principal component analysis and orthogonal projection to latent structure regression analysis revealed significant differences of both treatments in the metabolite changes, indicating that the mechanism of prolonging the banana shelf life may be different. Chitosan (1.25% w/v) treatment stored for 11 days resulted in a distinct accumulation of 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylic acid metabolite, an important precursor of ethylene that is responsible for the climacteric fruit ripening process. Low temperature (LT, 14 ± 1°C) treatment stored for 9 days resulted in higher levels of putrescine, a polyamine that responds to plant stress, at the end of ripening days. The findings clarify how chitosan delays fruit ripening and provides a deeper understanding of how storage at low temperature affects banana metabolism. The results may aid in more effective development of banana postharvest strategies.

A review on adaptation of banana (Musa spp.) to cold in subtropics

“…The regulation of signalling cascades like how plants discriminate the signalling components and their specific combinations for activating specific downstream biological processes for a given stress can be explained by metabolomics approach. However, metabolomics studies were carried out in banana only to elucidate the pseudostem elongation (Deng et al, 2021), post‐harvest senescence (Yuan et al, 2017) and ripening (Parijadi et al, 2022). Several morphological and physiological traits associated with cold tolerance if addressed to a greater extent would markedly strengthen the success in molecular biology.…”

Edible Coatings and Films for Preparation of Grapevine By-Product Infusions and in Freshly Processed Products

“…Chitosan is a natural cationic polysaccharide created by deacetylating the chitin that is found in animal shells, such as crustaceans, insect cuticles, and yeast [64]. In recent years, chitosan has been applied in several foods, like sweet cherries [104], kiwifruit [105] mango [106], litchi [107], grape [65,108,109] apricot [110], banana [111], and papaya [112], among others. Prathibhani et al [105] studied the effect of an edible coating of chitosan in kiwifruit and showed that this coating has an effective preservation technique, reducing respiration activity and delaying the changes in weight loss and firmness, thereby delaying ripening.…”

Integrated Studies of Banana on Remote Sensing, Biogeography, and Biodiversity: An Indonesian Perspective

“…For the metabolomics study, the metabolite profiles of chitosan and low temperature-treated banana was used to study the delay of the ripening mechanism on M. acuminata cv. Cavendish fruit [49]. A study on comparative genomics was also conducted to reveal variations among some ripening-related genes between M. acuminata and M. balbisiana, namely pectin methylesterase (PME) and pectin methylesterase inhibitor (PMEI) which are responsible for cell wall remodelling [50].…”