PHYSICAL-PROPERTIES AND STORAGE STABILITY OF APPLES AFFECTED WITH WATERCORE DISORDER

Apples with severe watercore disorder were more dense than apples with mild or no watercore disorder. Moisture content of affected tissue fr om apples with severe watercore disorder was significantly higher than tissue from apples with a mild disorder. Apples with watercore disord er were stored at either a refrigerated (1-degree-C) or a controlled a tmosphere (CA) condition (2% O2 and 2% CO2) for selected periods. A ma chine vision system for quantifying light transmission was used for de tecting watercore disorder. Apples stored under the refrigerated condi tion lost more mass (4.4%) than apples stored under the CA condition ( 1.8%). Apples stored under the refrigerated condition had less severe watercore disorder after storage (severity score = 1.69) than apples s tored under the CA condition (severity score = 2.42). There was no dif ference in light transmission score between apples stored at either re frigerated or CA condition for the first two weeks. Subsequently, ligh t transmission scores for apples stored under the refrigerated conditi on decreased faster than apples stored under the CA condition.