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Persian Shallot is a vegetable and at the same time a rare medicinal plant with a short shelf life. Edible coatings increased shelf life and maintain the quantitative and qualitative characteristics of some vegetable crops in the post-harvest stage. In this study, the effect of different amounts of chitosan (0.5, 1 and 2%), gelatin (0.25, 0.5 and 1%) and aloe gel (50, 75 and 100%) as edible coatings on fresh-cut persian shallot during 14 days of storage under refrigerated conditions (4±1 °C and 75-80% relative humidity) were investigated. The weight loss, pH, flavor index and total soluble solids during storage in coating treatments compared to control samples showed significantly less increase and amount of ascorbic acid, titratable acidity, pyruvic acid, total antioxidant capacity, total phenol, and soluble carbohydrates, showed significantly less decline. In this study, it was observed that edible coatings of chitosan (2%), gelatin (1%) and aloe gel (100%) had the greatest effect on maintaining the shelf life and quality properties of fresh-cut Persian shallot, respectively. According to the results obtained of this study, chitosan coating (2%) is recommended as a more suitable coating for fresh-cut Persian shallot.

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Antimicrobial edible coatings containing plant essential oils have various advantages and are currently being used to design biodegradable packaging. In this study, cinnamon essential oil was added at concentrations of 0, 0.3, 0.6 and 0.9% to the Shahri Balangu seed mucilage solution to produce a bioactive edible coating. Strawberry samples were coated with the edible coating and their physicochemical, microbial, and sensory changes were evaluated during a 10-day storage period at 4 °C. Compared to the control sample, the use of edible coating based on Shahri Balangu seed mucilage containing 0.9% of cinnamon essential oil, significantly inhibited the changes in pH, acidity, soluble solids (13.69% vs. 43.5% increase), microbial count (3.22 vs. 3.98 log CFU/g increase), hardness (6.74% vs. 33.05%), and sensory properties (color, odor, texture, and overall acceptance) of strawberry fruit during storage. Therefore, the edible coating based on Shahri Balangu seed mucilage containing cinnamon essential oil can be used as an active packaging to improve the quality and safety characteristics of various food products.
 

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This work's main objective was to investigate the gum Arabic effect on reducing oxidative stress in bell peppers during ripening. Gum Arabic in 6, 9, 12, and 15% aqueous solutions was applied as an edible coating before storage on mature bell peppers stored at 8°C and 90-95% relative humidity for 28 days. The fruits that were coated with 12% gum Arabic had the lowest rate of decay, weight loss, total carotenoid content, and peroxidation of membrane lipids, as well as the highest total antioxidant capacity, total phenol, ascorbic acid, and antioxidant enzyme activity (superoxide dismutase, peroxidase, and catalase) during storage compared to the control without coating and the fruit treated with 6 and 9% gum. Still, there was no statistically significant difference with the fruit treated with 15% gum Arabic except for the total carotenoid content. The amount of peroxidation of membrane lipids showed positive and high correlation coefficients with decay (**0.93) and physiological weight loss (**0.89), but with antioxidant capacity (-0.93**), ascorbic acid (**) -0.94), total phenol (-0.92**), activity of SOD (-0.96**), CAT (-0.87**) and POD (-0.86**) correlation. It was negative and high. The results showed that the use of 12% gum Arabic as an edible coating can delay oxidative stress and decay and maintain the antioxidant properties of the fruit for up to 28 days during storage at 8 degrees Celsius.

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In this research, the chemical properties and antifungal effect of Zhumeria majdae essential oil on the molds that cause decay and spoilage of orange fruit during storage were investigated. The hydrodistillation method was used to extract Z. majdae essential oil. The amount of total phenol (according to Folin Ciocalteu method), the amount of total flavonoid (based on the colorimetric method of aluminum chloride), antioxidant effect (based on DPPH and ABTS free radical inhibition methods) and antifungal activity (based on disc diffusion agar, well diffusion agar, minimum inhibitory concentration, and minimum fungicidal concentration) of essential oil against Penicillium italicum and Penicillium digitatum were investigated. The content of total phenol and total flavonoid of the essential oil were equal to 51.38 mg GAE/g and 22.18 mg QE/g, respectively. Z. majdae essential oil was able to inhibit DPPH and ABTS free radicals (61.50% and 67.85%, respectively). The results of the antifungal effect of Z. majdae essential oil showed that the average diameter of the inhibition zone for the fungal strains of P. italicum and P. digitatum in the disc diffusion agar method was 11.10 and 13.70 mm, respectively, and in the well diffusion agar method it was 12.20 and 14.90 mm. The minimum inhibitory concentration for these strains was equal to 4 and 2 mg/ml and the minimum fungicidal concentration was equal to 64 and 16 mg/ml. According to the results, Z. majdae essential oil can be used as a natural antimicrobial agent in order to prevent the growth of fungal strains that cause rot and spoilage of orange fruit during storage.