Investigating the effect of marigold flower extract on bioactive compounds, antioxidants and postharvest quality and shelf life of peach during storage

Peaches are a climacteric and highly perishable fruit with a short shelf life under ambient storage conditions which hampers further marketing and leads often to economic losses. Consequently, searching for pre-storage treatments to maintain shelf life and preserve the quality of peach fruit is an important task. Therefore, the present study was designed to investigate the efficiency of marigold flower extract (MFE) application on the shelf life and some quality attributes of peach fruit under ambient storage conditions. Peach fruit of cv. Early grand was treated with different concentrations of MFE (control, 10%, 20%, and 30%) and stored at 25 ± 2 °C for 8 days. The results revealed that at the end of the storage period, MFE (30%) suppressed the decrease of weight loss (21.51%), decay incidence (10.74%), solid-acid ratio (20.91%), pH (4.57), MDA (2.23 nmol/g FW) and H₂O₂ (3.01 nmol/g FW) compared to the control. Moreover, MFE (30%) increased the fruit firmness (93.93 N), soluble solid content (11.97 Brix), titratable acidity (0.57%), total sugar (10.01%), reducing sugars (5.15%), ascorbic acid (29.53 mg/100 mL), the total phenolic content (130.26 mg GAE/100 g FW) as well as the superoxide dismutase (309.79 U/mg), peroxidase (42.65 U/mg) and catalase (56.30 U/mg) enzyme activity compared to the untreated peach fruits. The results of our study suggested that the application of MFE particularly at 30% might be employed commercially as an environment-friendly approach to delay postharvest senescence and maintain quality attributes of peach fruit under ambient conditions.