Application of Alginate Film for Soursop Fruit Preservation

摘要

Soursop is an abundant and nutritive fruit, and, currently, it has been considered a medicinal plant. It has a fragrant sweet-sour white pulp and many dark seeds. There is growing demand for soursop fruit, whose sensorial qualities allow its use for fresh consumption. We conducted one research to prolong the shelf-life of soursop fresh fruit by alginate film coating on its surface. Our results showed that alginate contributed significantly different effects to weight loss, firmness, color, chlorophyl, total acidity and vitamin C content. After 30 days of preservation at 1.5% alginate, weight loss was noticed at the lowest level 2.74% compared to samples treated with 1% and 2% alginate. Moreover at 1.5% alginate, the treated soursop had discoloration in minimum. Firmness of treated fruit remained 5.59 (kg/cm~2) after 30 days of preservation, better than samples treated at 1% and 2% alginate. Biochemical characteristics of 1.5% treated sample showed the highest content, notably with the total soluble matter (7.39%), total organic acidity (5.07%) and vitamin C (17.16mg%). This demonstration gave us a promising aspect to extend fresh soursop shelf-life.