Effect of flax seed mucilage and guar gum coating enriched with postbiotics on postharvest storage of fig fruits (Ficus carica L.)

Abstract

Fresh fig or the common fig fruit is a climacteric and highly perishable fruit with a short shelf-life of ∼5 days. The edible coating is a prominent method to improve the shelf-life of fruits. Therefore, this study aims at analysing the different combinations of the coating solutions, namely: flax seed mucilage, guar gum, flax seed mucilage + 1 % guar gum, flax seed mucilage + 1 % guar gum + 10 % postbiotic (Lactobacillus plantarum and Lactobacillus delbrueckii), flax seed mucilage + 10 % postbiotic and 1 % guar gum + 10 % postbiotic-based edible coating solutions were employed to treat fresh fig fruits in order to enhance their shelf-life. The fruits were stored for 9 days at ambient temperature (25±2 °C) and the quality attributes of the fig fruits, such as the: titratable acidity, ascorbic acid content, ripening index, weight loss, firmness, color parameter, antioxidant properties, total phenol and flavonoid contents, were examined. This study showed that the flax seed mucilage + 1 % guar gum + 10 % postbiotic-coated fig fruits, improved the shelf-life, reduced postharvest-spoilage and had better quality attributes than the other coatings studied. Therefore, the flax seed mucilage and guar gum incorporated with postbiotics, as a novel edible coating, enhanced the postharvest shelf-life of fig fruits.