Canopy Spraying of Abscisic Acid to Improve Fruit Quality of Different Sweet Cherry Cultivars

Alson Time,Lee A Meisel,Nathalie Kuhn,José Manuel Donoso,Boris Sagredo,Claudio Ponce,Macarena Arellano

doi:10.3390/agronomy11101947

Alson Time, Lee A Meisel + Show 5 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy11101947

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Abstract

Abscisic acid (ABA) plays a major role in promoting ripening in sweet cherry, a non-climacteric fruit. Exogenous application of ABA has been performed to study fruit ripening and cracking, but this growth regulator is not used for commercial production. To determine the potential of this growth regulator to improve sweet cherry fruit quality, ABA canopy spraying was assayed in four cultivars. Canopy spraying of S-ABA significantly: (1) enhanced sweet cherry fruit color in ‘Glenred’, ‘Lapins’ and ‘Bing’ cultivars, but not in ‘Royal Rainier’ (a bi-colored cultivar), and (2) decreased fruit size and firmness in ‘Lapins’, ‘Bing’ and ‘Royal Rainier’. Seasonally reproducible effects were seen in ‘Lapins’ (mid/late-maturing) but not in ‘Glenred’ (early-maturing). Canopy spraying of nordihydroguaiaretic acid (NDGA) decreased color and increased fruit size in ‘Lapins’, but not in ‘Glenred’. Direct application of ABA on fruits attached to the tree, without application to the foliage, increased ‘Lapins’ fruit color without reducing size. These results suggest a localized fruit response to exogenous ABA application on fruit color development, but that a decrease in fruit size may be due to the effects of exogenous ABA on the tree canopy foliage.

Highlights

Chilean sweet cherry production and exportation have increased dramatically within the past decade, placing sweet cherry as the third most relevant Chilean fruit crop in terms of the volume of fruit production and the number of hectares planted (28,057 hectares in 2020 and 59,000 hectares predicted for 2023) [1,2]
Since Abscisic acid (ABA) has been reported to modify fruit quality parameters, the objective of this work was in the first place to assess the effect of canopy spraying of ABA on four phenotypically contrasting sweet cherry cultivars (‘Glenred’, ‘Lapins’, ‘Bing’, and ‘Royal Rainier’) that differ in color, blooming time, and maturity time
During the 2017 season, four sweet cherry cultivars were used for the ABA canopy spraying assay

Summary

Introduction

Chilean sweet cherry production and exportation have increased dramatically within the past decade, placing sweet cherry as the third most relevant Chilean fruit crop in terms of the volume of fruit production and the number of hectares planted (28,057 hectares in 2020 and 59,000 hectares predicted for 2023) [1,2] This increase has led to Chile becoming the top sweet cherry fruit exporter worldwide [3]. Fruit size and maturity (harvest) timing, as well as other sweet cherry quality trait parameters (i.e., firmness, color, soluble solids content), need to be optimized to ensure that the sweet cherry crop production is economically sustainable over time. Commercial sweet cherry production uses plant growth regulators as tools to “fine-tune” fruit production and fruit quality parameters (maturity timing, size, weight, firmness, soluble solids, acidity, color, accumulation of health-promoting compounds such as polyphenolics, resistance to cracking, and resistance to pitting)

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