Tomatoes (Solanum lycopersicum L.) are the world's most consumed fruits, both fresh and processed, and a second important vegetable, after potatoes. The species belong to the Solanaceae family, the genus Solanum and the Lycopersicon section. Besides being consumed in many ways, both fresh and processed, tomatoes have an important role in health because they are an important source of vitamin C, potassium, folic acid and carotenoids such as lycopene and ß-carotene. Carotenoids are pigments synthesized during fruit maturation and responsible for the final colour of tomato fruits. Lycopene is a natural red pigment with significant antioxidant properties involved in reducing the incidence of various forms of cancer. Twelve tomato varieties, comprising four F1 hybrids (round breeding line tomatoes), and the parental forms from which they were created, were evaluated for their lycopene and ß-carotene content using high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and spectrophotometry. Lycopene and ß-carotene content varied significantly among tomato hybrids, with USAB F1 having the highest content of lycopene (33.34 mg/kg of fresh weight) and Banato F1 in ß-carotene (1.59 mg/kg of fresh weight ). Analyzing the behaviour of the hybrids versus their parents, it was observed that for β-carotene the recorded value was close to that of the patern genitor in all the studied hybrids, whereas in the case of lycopene there was no relationship between the values recorded in comparative hybrids with parental lines. The hybrids with high lycopene, ß-carotene has low values and vice versa. The lycopene content analysis shows the Crimson genes are not present in hybrids created by us. Results indicate that genetics may have a strong influence on tomato β-carotene content.

HPLC, lycopene, βcarotene, F1 tomato hybrids

biology

Presentation: poster