Resumo

VILAS BOAS, Eduardo Valério de Barros; REIS, Camila Martins Fonseca  e  MELO, Anderson Adriano Martins. Use of chemical mixtures for firmness maintenance of fresh-cut 'Silver' banana. Ciênc. agrotec. [online]. 2009, vol.33, n.1, pp. 237-244. ISSN 1413-7054.  http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S1413-70542009000100033.

Banana constitutes an interesting alternative to make fruit salad. Nevertheless, they have short shelf life after cutting due to the fast loss of firmness. The objective of this work was to evaluate the effect of chemical mixtures containing calcium chloride, ascorbic acid and L-cysteine with the use of active modified atmosphere (10 kPa CO₂ and 2 kPa O₂), emphasizing the lost of firmness on the quality and shelf life of fresh-cut 'Silver' banana. Soluble pectin content and the percentage of solubilization increased significantly throughout the conservation period. The lost of firmness and the increase of pectinmethylesterase and polygalacturonase activities presented a significant interaction among the studied factors (treatment/time). The slices treated with chemical mixtures remained with good characteristics for consume until 3 days of conservation. The treatments with an isolated initial gas injection or together with the chemical mixture treatment didn't promote better firmness retention of fresh-cut 'Silver' banana in relation to the treatment containing 1% (w/v) L-cysteine + 1% (w/v) ascorbic acid + 1% (w/v) calcium chloride in the chemical mixture.

Palavras-chave : Musa sapientum; polygalacturonase; petinmethylesterase; calcium chloride; active modified atmosphere; cysteine.