15AGRITECHCAT3 SafePod: New technology for intelligent control of fresh produce storage

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Longer-term storage extends the marketing period for UK grown apples and pears, but is an increasing challenge as restrictions on chemical use become more stringent. One route to achieve this is low O2 storage, but this is risky due to the possibility of low O2 damage. By providing the means to detect the onset of stress in stored apples, SafePod enables storage closer to the tolerance limits of atmospheric composition, thus improving fruit quality and minimising losses due todisorders.SafePod detects stress through changes in respiratory characteristics that indicate a switch to damaging anaerobic respiration. SafePod is a chamber placed within a fruit store which holds a sample of fruit representative of the whole store consignment. The SafePod atmosphere can be isolated from that of the whole store, and so that the respiratory characteristics of fruit can be measured using new-generation gas sensors.The key research component within this project is to determine the relationship between the changes in the respiratory characteristics of the fruit and the optimum storage environment. This is expected to differ by fruit variety according to tissue characteristics such as density and mineral composition, and also to be highly dependent on fruit maturity. The researchers will work closely with the rest of the consortium to optimise the use of the prototype SafePod in growers' stores and to provide Best Practice Guides on how to translate the SafePod data to optimise storage strategies.