IMPACT OF EXOGENOUS AND ENDOGENOUS FACTORS ON THE SHELF-LIFE OF FRESH-CUT LEAFY ASIAN VEGETABLES

Leafy Asian vegetables are common constituents of fresh-cut salad mixes. Salad mixes consist of a number of constituent leaf types, varying both by species, cultivar and physiological leaf age. Many of these vegetables, which are predominated by Brassica species, have little or no published information on their storage characteristics. The little data that is available is scant, and is based on the study of intact shoots, rather than fresh-cut leaves (Hirata et al., 1987; Lazan et al., 1987; Wang et al., 1989; Yang, 1992). With this in mind, the present paper aims to examine how temperature, atmosphere and physiological leaf-age impact on the shelf-life of several important leafy Asian vegetables used by the Australian fresh-cut industry.