Author(s):

Aadil Afzal Mir, Monika Sood, Julie D Bandral and Neeraj Gupta

Abstract: Peaches are climacteric fruits with short post harvest life due to its high moisture content and relatively high metabolic activity during post harvest phase. Therefore, the present study was carried out to find out the effect of active packaging and different levels of ventilation on quality of peach fruits under refrigerated storage conditions. Peach (Prunus persica L. Batch) fruits of cultivar “Shan-e- Punjab” were harvested at colour break stage and packed in thermocol trays wrapped with polypropylene (PP) bags comprising the following treatments: T₁ (control), T₂ (ethylene absorber + 0 perforation), T₃ (ethylene absorber + 4 perforations), T₄ (ethylene absorber + 8 perforations), T₅ (oxygen absorber + 0 perforation), T₆ (oxygen absorber + 4 perforations), T₇ (oxygen absorber + 8 perforations), respectively. The packed fruits were stored under refrigerated conditions and analysed at regular interval of 7 days to ascertain the changes occurring in physical, chemical, and sensory quality parameters. Minimum mean physiological loss in weight of 3.04 percent, decay percentage of 1.83 per cent, specific gravity of 0.959 and TSS of 10.41 ⁰B were observed in T₃ (ethylene absorber + 4 perforations). However, T₁ (control) recorded the lowest mean ascorbic acid content of 9.16 mg per 100g, total phenol content of 60.15 mg per 100g and antioxidant activity of 16.98 per cent and antioxidant activity of 16.98 and 16.87 per cent.. Sensory evaluation of actively packaged peach fruits revealed that T₃ (ethylene absorber + 4 perforations) recorded the highest mean score for overall acceptability (7.65). Overall, T₃ (ethylene absorber + 4 perforations) was best suited active packaging to retain quality as well as reduce the spoilage of peach fruits during storage under refrigerated conditions.

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