Effects of Physical Active Packaging on Storage Quality, Respiratory and Energy Metabolism of Lentinula edodes during Storage

To investigate the effects of ordinary PE packaging (CK) and physically active packaging (PA) on post-harvest storage quality, respiratory metabolism, and energy metabolism of Lentinula edodes, L. edodes '808' was used as experimental material, and stored at (4±1) ℃ and 90%±5% relative humidity for 12 d. The sensory evaluation, weight loss, hardness, total soluble solids, soluble protein, respiration rate, key enzyme activities in respiration and energy metabolism, energy substance, and energy charge of L. edodes were measured every 3 d. The results showed that PA treatment delayed the deterioration of the sensory quality of L. edodes, inhibited the increase of the weight loss rate, retarded the decline of the hardness, total soluble solids, and soluble proteins, reduced the respiratory intensity, and postponed the emergence of L. edodes respiratory peaks. Further research indicated that L. edodes under PA treatment were able to maintain higher levels of cytochrome C oxidase (CCO) and malate dehydrogenase (MDH) enzyme activities while inhibiting the rapid increase in glucose-6-phosphate isomerase (PGI), succinate dehydrogenase (SDH) and pyruvate dehydrogenase (PDH) enzyme activities. Meanwhile, PA treatment also suppressed the degradation of ATP and ADP in L. edodes, and maintained a high level of energy charge. The correlation analysis revealed that the sensory quality of L. edodes was a highly significantly positive correlation with hardness, total soluble solids, MDH, ATP, and energy charge (P<0.01), significantly positive correlation with soluble proteins and ADP (P<0.05), and highly significantly negative correlation with weight loss, and AMP (P<0.01), indicating that storage quality of L. edodes during storage in PA group was strongly correlated with energy levels. Therefore, physical active packaging can effectively inhibit the post-harvest respiration and energy metabolism of L. edodes, maintain storage quality, and reduce economic losses.