Abstract
Strawberry is a typical nonclimacteric fruit, whose ripening mechanism needs to be further investigated. Sucrose has been recently proved as a signal molecule, participating in strawberry fruit ripening and related processes. While in the effects of sucrose application timing and concentration on ripening, fruit qualities remain unclear, as well as the transcriptome-wide details about the effects of sucrose on the gene expression involved in ripening-related processes. In this study, strawberry fruits at the degreening (DG), white (W), and initial-red (IR) stages were treated with different concentration of sucrose. The results showed that anthocyanin was increased while total polyphenol concentration (TPC) and total flavonoid concentration (TFC) were decreased during fruit development after sucrose treatment. Interestingly, It was showed that 100 mM sucrose application at the DG stage had the most obvious effects on fruit ripening; it made all the fruits turn into full-red (FR) around 4 days (d) earlier than the control, while it did not affect fruit quality traits and most bioactive compounds in the FR fruits. Subsequently, RNA sequencing (RNAseq) of the fruits collected at 8 days after 100 mM sucrose treatment was carried out. It was suggested that 993 genes were differentially expressed comparing with the control. Transcriptome-based expression analysis revealed that sucrose induced the expression of genes involved in the AsA and anthocyanin biosynthesis, while largely suppressed the expression of genes in TCA. The results obtained in this study provided more expression profiles of ripening-related genes under the treatment of sucrose, which will contribute to a better understanding for the mechanism underlying sucrose-induced fruit ripening.
Highlights
Fruit ripening is a complex developmentally regulated and genetically controlled process, which activates a whole set of biochemical and physiological pathways [1,2,3,4]
When the fruits were treated at the DG stage, 50, 100, and 150 mM sucrose could make the fruits turn into FR faster than the control
50 mM sucrose treatment had no significant effects on fruit coloring; it made all the fruits turn into FR on the 20th d after the treatment, which was the same with control (Figure 1(b))
Summary
Fruit ripening is a complex developmentally regulated and genetically controlled process, which activates a whole set of biochemical and physiological pathways [1,2,3,4]. According to the ethylene production and their physiological differences in respiratory mode during ripening, fleshy fruits are generally classified as climacteric and nonclimacteric In climacteric fruit such as tomato, kiwifruit, apple, and banana, numerous research data have been accumulated on the major regulation of ripening process by ethylene [5,6,7]. Exogenous sucrose accelerated the ripening process of postharvest tomato fruit and upregulated the expression of ethylene biosynthesis genes [17]. It could induce anthocyanin accumulation, which is the most obvious trait of fruit ripening [18,19,20]. The results would be a benefit to the underlying mechanism of strawberry fruit ripening, especially under the regulation of sucrose, with the purpose of improving the fruit quality
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