The influence of post-harvest UV-C and pulsed light treatments on quality and antioxidant properties of tomato fruits during storage

• Post-harvest PL and UV-C treatment enhance the antioxidant properties of tomato.
• The effects depend on the light treatment conditions and the applied energy dose.
• UV-C light appears to be slightly more effective than PL treatment.

In this work, immature green tomatoes were exposed to different doses of either PL or UV-C irradiation (1-8 J/cm2) and then stored at 20 ± 2°C for up to 21 days. The effects of light treatments on the physical-chemical properties and antioxidant compounds of tomato fruits, were evaluated during storage and compared with those of untreated samples. Results indicated that, at the energy doses investigated, pH and °Brix of all samples were not affected by light treatments and storage period. The skin colour of untreated and treated fruits turned from green to red during storage and no appreciable influence of the light treatments was detected. However, the content of lycopene, total carotenoid, phenolic compounds and antioxidant activity of light treated samples increased during storage up to, respectively, 6.2, 2.5, 1.3, and 1.5-fold, when compared with the untreated samples. These results demonstrated that PL and UV-C irradiation have the potential to enhance the accumulation of health-beneficial food compounds in tomatoes without significant changes of the physical properties of the product during storage.