PHYSICAL AND CHEMICAL PROPERTIES OF SWEET ORANGE GENOTYPES AVAILABLE IN BANGLADESH

Abstract

Importance of fruits as valuable food resources, attention has been paid in recent years to study their physicochemical properties. Therefore, this investigation was undertaken to measure the physicochemical properties of the sweet orange genotype available in Bangladesh. A total of 8 genotypes including 3 released varieties (BAU Malta-1, BAU Malta-3, and BARI Malta-1) and 5 lines (CS Jain-001, CS Jain-002, CS Jain-003, CS Ram-001, and Variegated Malta) were included in this trial. Maximum average fruit weight (286.00 g), fruit size in terms of length (92.00 mm), and diameter (82.00 mm), mesocarp thickness (10.00 mm), and width of epicarp equatorial area (76.00 mm) was recorded from CS Jain-001 while the maximum number of segment (28.00), the diameter of fruit axis (23.66 mm), juice content (41.44%), titratable acidity (0.99%) and TSS: TA (33.73) was recorded from BAU Malta-3. TSS and juice pH was recorded maximum of 10.21% and 4.48, respectively in BAU Malta-1. Sugar content was found to be as follows, reducing sugar was the maximum in CS Jain-001 (3.50 %) while the highest total sugar (4.68%) was recorded in BAU Malta-1. Variegated Malta produced the maximum (48.45 mg/100 ml juice) ascorbic acid while CS Jain-001 contained maximum (8.35 mg/100 ml juice) ß-carotene. Therefore, considering fruit quality, BAU Malta-3, BARI Malta-1 can be used as fresh fruit. However, considering the fruit size, CS Jain-001 and CS Jain-002 could be used as breeding material to develop a new sweet orange variety with higher yield potential.