AUTHOR(S):

George Xanthopoulos, Helen Manolopoulou, Gregory Lambrinos

TITLE

Comparative kinetics study of chlorophyll and colour degradation for three leafy vegetables

KEYWORDS

kinetics; chlorophyll degradation; hue angle; multiresponse modelling.

ABSTRACT

The chlorophyll and colour degradation of lettuce, spinach and rocket, harvested at their commercial maturity were estimated at 0, 5, 10 and 20 oC. A first-order kinetics model based on the time-temperature integral was developed and tested to describe the chlorophyll and colour degradation of the three vegetables. The kinetic model described efficiently the experimental chlorophyll and colour degradation data. The spinach and rocket exhibited similar chlorophyll degradation rate while lettuce had different. The energy of activation for the chlorophyll degradation was in the same order for the rocket and spinach and 21% higher for the lettuce. The spinach exhibited increased sensitivity regarding colour degradation at 20 oC compared to rocket and lettuce. Plotting the total chlorophyll values with the respective hue angles generated three parallel linear plots, one for each vegetable, the classification of which follows the respective ranking of respiration rate of the three vegetables.

Cite this paper

George Xanthopoulos, Helen Manolopoulou, Gregory Lambrinos. (2016) Comparative kinetics study of chlorophyll and colour degradation for three leafy vegetables. International Journal of Agricultural Science, 1, 15-26