THE EFFECT OF TREATMENT WITH CHITOSAN ON THE STORAGE ABILITY OF JUJUBE FRUITS (Ziziphus spp) CV.CHIBCHAB

The current study was conducted on jujube fruits, Chibchab cultivar that were collected from a commercial orchard in the Al-Harthah region, Basra, south of Iraq for the 2018-2019 growing season in order to improve the storage ability of fruits by treating them with chitosan. The fruits were treated with three concentrations of chitosan (0, 1 and 2%) by immersing them in, then packed with perforated polyethylene bags (8 holes per bag, the diameter of the hole is 4 mm). The bag expanded to 1 kg of fruits then stored at 4°C in the refrigerator. A factorial experiment was designed using a complete randomized design (CRD) with three replicates. The most important results showed that the fruits treated with 2% chitosan outperformed the rest of the fruits with the least weight loss and the highest concentration of vitamin C, while the untreated fruits recorded the highest percentage of total soluble solids, total titratable acidity and the highest weight loss.