Abstract
Some members of the Rosaceae family, particularly pear, contain stone cells in their fruits. Although stone cells in pear fruits are well studied, relatively little attention has been given to loquat stone cells. Only a few reports have suggested a relationship between stone cell traits and storage and transport tolerance of loquat fruits. Previously, we generated the variety JT8 from the interspecific hybrid of the loquat cultivar Jiefangzhong (JFZ; Eriobotrya japonica Lindl. cv. Jiefangzhong, female parent) and wild Taiwanese loquat (TL; E. deflexa Nakai, male parent). The JT8 fruits had a granular feel, similar to that of pear fruits, due to the presence of stone cells. In this study, the shape, size, development, and distribution dynamics of stone cells of Eriobotrya plants were thoroughly investigated. The results showed that loquat stone cells are brachysclereids and often contain typical branching pits. Loquat stone cells were distributed as both single stone cells and in stone cell clusters (SCCs), and the density of the stone cells near the core was higher than that near the peel. Stone cell density first increased and then decreased during fruit development. These traits noted in Eriobotrya were very similar to those observed in pear, indicating a close relationship between loquat and pear. Moreover, the contents, density dynamics, and aggregation traits of stone cells of the interspecific hybrid JT8 were derived from the male parent (TL). Transgressive segregation was likely exhibited in the content of stone cells and the size of the SCCs. More specifically, the content of stone cells reached 1.61% (w/w). In extreme cases, SCCs of JT8 exceeded 1,000 μm in length and 500 μm in width. This demonstrated that stone cell traits could be transmitted from parent to progeny through interspecific hybridization. The density dynamics of stone cells in two loquat cultivars with different storage and transport tolerances were also investigated, which indicated that the cultivar with more stone cells was more tolerant to storage and transport. We suggest that wild loquat genetic resources containing stone cells in Eriobotrya plants can be used to gradually improve the storage and transport tolerance of loquat fruits.
Highlights
Loquat (Eriobotrya japonica Lindl.), a characteristic evergreen fruit tree species originating from China, is distributed in more than 30 countries, mainly in East Asian, South Asian, and coastal Mediterranean countries
The results showed that the high stone cell contents of the interspecific hybrids probably came from the male parent wild loquat, which could exhibit transgressive inheritance
Microscopic observation of stone cells extracted from the fruits of the interspecific hybrid JT8 revealed many large stone cells or stone cell clusters (Figure 1)
Summary
Loquat (Eriobotrya japonica Lindl.), a characteristic evergreen fruit tree species originating from China, is distributed in more than 30 countries, mainly in East Asian, South Asian, and coastal Mediterranean countries. Careful researchers have noted that some loquat cultivars contain stone cells distributed within their fruits, little attention has been given to stone cells in loquat, which belongs to Rosaceae. To the best of our knowledge, many Rosaceae fruits contain stone cells, including those of Pyrus spp., Eriobotrya japonica, Chaenomeles sinensis, Crataegus pinnatifida, Prunus mume, Prunus armeniaca, Prunus salicina, and so forth (Huang et al, 2005; Sun and Li, 2006; Lin et al, 2009; Pan, 2011; Wu et al, 2013). The fruits of pear cultivars contain a large number of stone cells that significantly affect the quality of their fruits, thereby attracting much attention and making these cultivars model plants for the study of fruit stone cells (Wu et al, 2013). When describing the overall quality of hawthorn fruits, it was only mentioned that there were few stone cells (Pan, 2011)
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