Fountain of youth found for tomatoes and other fruit

[caption id="attachment_11069" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Fresh tomatoes"][/caption]

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Carol Forsloff - A Purdue professor has found a way to extend the shelf life of tomatoes and other fruits in a "fountain of youth" process that can prolong the edibility of these items.

Avtar Handa is a professor of horticulture at Purdue University and has discovered that by adding a yeast gene a compound is produced that actually slows aging and delays microbial decay in tomatoes, a process that could transfer to other fruits.

"We can inhibit the aging of plants and extend the shelf life of fruits by an additional week for tomatoes," Handa said. "This is basic fundamental knowledge that can be applied to other fruits."

The organic compound spermidine is what Handa refers to that is found in all living cells, a polyamine.   Scientists don't yet know all the functions of this compound but believe that they enhance nutritional value and shelf life.

"At least a few hundred genes are influenced by polyamines, maybe more," Mattoo said. "We see that spermidine is important in reducing aging. It will be interesting to discover what other roles it can have."

A graduate student in Handa's laboratory,Savithri Nambeesa,  introduced the yeast spermidine synthase gene, which led to increased production of spermidine in the tomatoes.   This allowed fully ripened tomatoes to last a full eight days longer before showing signs of shriveling.

"It increased the quality of the fruit," Handa said. "If a tomato goes to market, people won't buy it if it has started to shrivel. If we can stop that wrinkling, we can extend the market time of the fruit."

Mattoo said the finding could have implications for areas that don't often get fresh fruit.

"Shelf life is a major problem for any produce in the world, especially in countries such as in Southeast Asia and Africa that cannot afford controlled-environment storage," Mattoo said.

Handa said tomato growers and possibly other fruit growers could use the finding soon if they wanted through either transgenic plants or natural breeding methods.

"We can add this gene to the tomatoes or look at natural variation and select the cultivars that already have a high level of this gene's expression," Handa said.

This  discovery of maintaining the shelf life of fruits can be helpful to all the countries of the world, but especially the poorer ones as sustaining foods and finding new ways of breeding is important.