Molecular Control of Fruit Ripening and Sensory Quality of Charentais Melon
Résumé
Traditional Charentais melons have a typical climacteric behavior with
ethylene playing a major role in the regulation of the ripening process. Genetic studies
using climacteric and non-climacteric types of Cucumis melo demonstrated that the
climacteric character is dominant and conferred by 2 duplicated loci only which are of
great importance for the regulation of storability and sensory quality. Commercial
varieties of Charentais melon with long shelf-life have been generated, some of them
by crossing with a non-ripening Charentais genotype (Vauclusien). The introduction
of the long shelf-life character resulted in undesirable loss of aroma volatiles
production. The inhibition of ethylene synthesis by knocking-down ACC oxidase gene
expression has been achieved in Charentais melon. It results is a strong inhibition of
the synthesis of aroma volatiles while the accumulation of sugars is not affected or is
even improved and the softening of the flesh is strongly affected but not abolished. It
was also demonstrated that ethylene-inhibited fruit exhibited better resistance to
chilling injury. Due to the importance of aroma volatiles in sensory quality and to the
strong negative correlation between aroma production and ethylene synthesis, we have
developed a research program aimed at isolating genes involved in the synthesis of
volatile esters, compounds that are essential for the flavor of Cantaloupe melons. We
report here on the recent advances in the field with special emphasis on the characterization
of two families of genes encoding aldehyde reductases and alcohol acyl
transferases.
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