Volume 46, Issue 3 e16363
ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Melatonin enhanced the disease resistance by regulating reactive oxygen species metabolism in postharvest jujube fruit

Lele Zhang

Lele Zhang

College of Food Science, Shanxi Normal University, Linfen, China

Contribution: Writing - review & editing

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Youwei Yu

Youwei Yu

College of Food Science, Shanxi Normal University, Linfen, China

Contribution: ​Investigation, Resources

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Lulu Chang

Lulu Chang

College of Food Science, Shanxi Normal University, Linfen, China

Contribution: Conceptualization, Methodology

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Xiaojia Wang

Xiaojia Wang

College of Food Science, Shanxi Normal University, Linfen, China

Contribution: Data curation

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Shaoying Zhang

Corresponding Author

Shaoying Zhang

College of Food Science, Shanxi Normal University, Linfen, China

Correspondence

Shaoying Zhang, College of Food Science, Shanxi Normal University, Linfen 041001, China.

Email: [email protected]

Contribution: Formal analysis, Funding acquisition

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First published: 08 January 2022
Citations: 10

Abstract

Melatonin (MT), as a putative pleiotropic signal molecule, could participate in inducing postharvest disease resistance and inhibiting postharvest pathogen infection in fruit. In this study, we investigate the mechanism of induced resistance by MT treatment against Alternaria rot of jujube. The results showed that 2 and 20 μmol/L MT did not have direct antimicrobial activity, 200 μmol/L MT had little influence on antifungal activity against Alternaria alternata in vitro. MT significantly reduced the lesion area of fruit inoculated with A. alternata. MT decreased the relative electrolytic leakage, malondialdehyde content, hydrogen peroxide, and the rate of superoxide anion production, while enhanced the ascorbic acid and reduced glutathione contents. Furthermore, MT observably increased the defensive enzyme activities of superoxide dismutase, the catalase, ascorbate peroxidase, peroxidase. Accordingly, these results indicated that MT treatment increased the disease resistance of jujube fruit by regulating reactive oxygen species metabolism.

Novelty impact statement

The results showed that MT treatment could inhibit the expansion of lesion diameter, reduce the decay rate of winter jujube, and reduce the accumulation of reactive oxygen species by activating the oxidase system, thus enhancing the resistance of winter Jujube fruit to Alternaria alternata infection by adjusting the ROS mechanism.

CONFLICT OF INTEREST

The authors have declared no conflicts of interest for this article.

DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT

The raw/processed data required to reproduce these findings cannot be shared at this time as the data also forms part of an ongoing study.

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