Eating quality of ‘Abate Fetel’ pears stored in dynamic CA in relation to maturity at harvest

‘Abate Fetel’ is considered a high-quality pear cultivar in Italy due to its excellent eating quality. Maturity at harvest and storage protocol strongly affect quality. This work aimed at studying the eating quality of ‘Abate Fetel’ pears after storage under dynamic controlled atmosphere (DCA) and in air (NA) in relation to fruit maturity non-destructively measured at harvest by time-resolved reflectance spectroscopy (TRS). At harvest 150 pears were measured for μa670 by TRS, classified in less-LeM, mediumMeM and more-MoM maturity classes, and stored for 12 weeks in NA and DCA (0.8 kPa O2, 0.45 kPa CO2) at -0.5°C. At harvest and after 4 and 7 d post-storage shelf life, pears were analysed for firmness, soluble solids (SSC), acidity (TA), sugar and organic acid composition, and 7 d LeM and MoM pears were submitted to sensory analysis. At harvest LeM fruit had higher firmness and glucose and lower sucrose content than MoM ones. PCA analysis on storage data explained 70.4% of variance. PC1 opposed mechanical and sensory firmness, graininess, astringency, SSC and sucrose to juiciness and glucose. PC2 grouped sweetness, sourness, juiciness, aroma, TA, sorbitol and malic acid against mechanical and sensory firmness. NA-MoM pears showed the highest PC1 scores and negative PC2 scores, being the firmest, the grainiest, the least juicy with the highest sucrose and citric acid contents. NA-LeM fruit had negative PC1 and PC2 scores, being the least sweet, acid and aromatic with low amounts of fructose and malic acid. DCA-MoM fruit had the highest PC2 scores with low but positive PC1 scores and were characterized by the highest sweetness and acidity, high TA, fructose and malic acid contents and the highest scores for aroma. DCA pears showed the lowest PC1 scores and high PC2 scores in LeM fruit. DCA-LeM pears were the juiciest, the least grainy and astringent with the highest amount of glucose. Our results indicate that classifying pears at harvest in homogeneous maturity classes by using TRS allow to better define the best storage practices in order to obtain fruit with quality characteristics that can satisfy the consumer expectations.