Metabolite content and antioxidant potential of blood oranges as affected by rootstock

Rootstocks influence several fruit qualitative parameters. The aim of the study was to investigate the role of the rootstock on the accumulation of primary and secondary metabolites in the juices of sweet blood orange cv. Tarocco Sciré at different maturation stages. The tested rootstocks were Carrizo citrange, widely spead in the citrus industry, in comparison with C35 citrange, Bitters and Furr citrandarins recently introduced and on which little informations are available. Three simple sugars and 28 different specialized metabolites were quantified by HPLC/Uv-vis/DAD and HPLC/ESI-MS, the antioxidant potential was assessed by ABTS+ and DPPH•. Analytical data obtained were processed by robust statistical tools that allowed us to highlight the role of the metabolites during maturation for the nutraceutical value. Bitters and C35 anticipated fruit ripening of nearly one month; Bitters and Furr reached the highest pigmentation one month earlier than the other genotypes.