Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Application of Active EM-Calcium in Green Agricultural Production — Case Study in Tomato and…
http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/58329
2.2.2. Forms of Ca in fruit
The Ca accumulation in tomato fruits can directly reflect the effect of EM-calcium solution.
Fig. 1 gave the content of different forms of Ca in tomato fruits with different treatments.
According to the survey results, the EM-calcium application was mainly beneficial for the
accumulation of Alc-Ca, H
2
O-Ca, NaCl-Ca, and HAC-Ca, and which had no obvious effects
on the HCl-Ca and Res-Ca accumulation.
Ca pectate (NaCl-Ca) was the main Ca form presented in the ripe tomato fruits, occupied more
than 75% of total Ca content, as the figures shown. The NaCl-Ca content of SR, SF, SL, SO was
significantly higher (P<0.05) than that of CK, and the increases of SL were the most obvious,
closely followed by SO, which implied that SL and SO were conductive to the accumulation
of NaCl-Ca. While no significant difference (P>0.05) for NaCl-Ca content was observed
between ST and CK. Water-soluble calcium The EM-calcium application also had great
influences on the accumulation of water-soluble Ca including the Alc-Ca and H
2
O-Ca in
tomato fruits. Based on the results, SL increased the content of Alc-Ca and H
2
O-Ca most
significantly (P<0.05) by 2.19 and 0.71 multiples respectively in comparison with CK. Besides,
SR, SF, SO and ST increased Alc-Ca content significantly (P<0.05), and SR, SF increased H
2
O-
Ca content significantly (P<0.05), compared to CK. The H
2
O-Ca content in the tomato fruits of
SO and ST was significantly different (P<0.05), but there were no significant differences
between that of SO and CK, either ST and CK.
HAC-Ca content of SL and SO was significantly higher (P<0.05) than that of CK by 65.68% and
36.58% respectively, and the differences among CK, SR, SF and ST were not significant (P>0.05).
Dissimilarly, HCl-Ca content in SF, SL, SO was 24.77%, 29.05%, 10.05% lower than that in CK,
and the effects of ST and SR on the variation of HCl-Ca content were not obvious. Res-Ca
accounted for the smallest share of total Ca, except for ST, no significant differences of which
were found among the treatments (P>0.05), indicating that EM-calcium application had little
effects on the Res-Ca accumulation in tomato fruits.
2.2.3. Fruit quality
Fig. 2 showed some quality indexes of tomatoes observed with different spraying methods.
Vitamin C (L-ascorbic acid) is essential for all living plants where it functions as the main
hydrosoluble antioxidant (Lima-Silva et al., 2012). SF, SL, SO increased the vitamin C of tomato
fruit significantly (P<0.05) compared to CK, the increases of SL was most obvious,with the
value of 25.38%. However, SR and ST did not affect the content of vitamin C greatly.
Tomato taste quality is largely determined by the contents of soluble sugar (Dorais, 2001).
According to the results, the soluble sugar content of SL and SO was significantly higher
(P<0.05) than that of CK by 9.65% and 7.20% respectively, but there were no significant
differences (P>0.05) among that of CK, SR, SF and ST.
SL obtained the highest content of soluble protein, which was significantly higher (P<0.05)
than that in CK. SO took the second place, slightly lower than SL but no significant differences
