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Aroma compounds in mini-watermelon fruits from different grafting combinations.

BACKGROUND
In recent years, mini-watermelons have increased in popularity. To maintain production and quality standards, various agronomic techniques have been applied. In Cucurbitaceae family, grafting technique has been used to improve the resistance to abiotic stresses, crop productivity and fruit qualitative characteristics. Several papers are present in literature on this matter, but no information on the influence of grafting on the aroma compounds of mini-watermelons are available. Hence, our research aimed to evaluate the effect of some rootstocks, which were selected on the basis of their tolerance to pathogens, on the quality of mini-watermelons, with particular attention to the volatiles aroma compounds.


RESULTS
Volatile aroma compounds were analysed by Solid Phase Microextraction-Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (SPME-GC-MS). The most represented compounds were C6 and C9 aldehydes and alcohols, which characterize the fruit aroma of the Cucurbitaceae family: (Z)-2-nonenal, (E,Z)-2,6-nonadienal, (Z)-3-nonen-1-ol and (Z,Z)-3,6-nonadien-1-ol prevailed. Quantitative differences resulted in relation to the different selected rootstocks. Among these, the RS841 rootstock was found to be the most suitable to maintain yield, quality parameters, sensory characteristic and volatile aroma compounds of the mini-watermelon fruits.


CONCLUSION
The result highlighted that the rootstock as happened for other Cucurbitaceae varieties, influence the fruit quality and the plant yield also for the mini water melon; it follows from that the importance of screening for rootstock/scion combinations in order to select the graft able to provide resistance to abiotic stresses, and at the same time yield and fruit quality. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.