Morphological and physico-biochemical characterization of various tomato cultivars in a simplified soilless media

This study aimed to investigate nine commercial cultivars of tomato, in order to identify the most suitable cultivar in terms of morphological (plant height, fruit size, fruit weight and total yield) and physico-biochemical (color, firmness, total soluble solid, titratable acidity, ascorbic acid, total sugar, reducing and non-reducing sugar, β-carotene and lycopene) attributes. Plants were cultured hydroponically in the greenhouse. Results revealed that the morphological attributes of Beefsteak Group (BG) of tomatoes was significantly better than that of Cherry Group (CG). In addition, CG has higher concentration of biochemical attributes, mainly β-carotene, sugars, total soluble solids (TSS) and ascorbic acid contents. Within CG, cv. Aria was found to be the best for higher sugar contents, β-carotene and ascorbic acid contents; while, TSS was higher in the cv. Claree. Similarly in BG, cv. Sahel had the highest value of lycopene, β-carotene, TSS; whereas, lowest sugar contents were found in cv. Dirk. As far as firmness is concerned, cv. Naram (BG) was found to be more firm, than cv. Aria (CG). The highest total yield was recorded for cv. Vernal; in BG and in cv. Claree for CG, depicting that BG had significantly higher total yield, compared with CG.