Regulation of fruit ascorbic acid concentrations during ripening in high and low vitamin C tomato cultivars.

ABSTRACT:

Background

To gain insight into the regulation of fruit ascorbic acid (AsA) pool in tomatoes, a combination of metabolite analyses, non-labelled and radiolabelled substrate feeding experiments, enzyme activity measurements and gene expression studies were carried out in fruits of the 'low-' and 'high-AsA' tomato cultivars 'Ailsa Craig' and 'Santorini' respectively.

Results

The two cultivars exhibited different profiles of total AsA (totAsA, AsA + dehydroascorbate) and AsA accumulation during ripening, but both displayed a characteristic peak in concentrations at the breaker stage. Substrate feeding experiments demonstrated that the L-galactose pathway is the main AsA biosynthetic route in tomato fruits, but that substrates from alternative pathways can increase the AsA pool

SUBMITTER: Mellidou I 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3548725 | biostudies-literature | 2012 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature