ASHS 2024 Conference

Insufficient transport of calcium to and throughout the cortex of apple is a primary factor contributing to bitter pit, a disorder characterized by dark lesions on the fruit surface. Calcium transport, in-planta, occurs solely in the xylem. Progressive transport dysfunction of xylem limits calcium concentration in the peel and subtending tissue. Rapid fruit growth may accelerate xylem dysfunction due to the stretching, shearing, or compressing of xylem elements. The relative time course of these events and subsequent effect on calcium concentration of peel tissues is not well understood. Growth rate of fruit was manipulated by manually adjusting the crop load of 6th leaf ‘Honeycrisp' trees to either 4 (low), 8 (moderate), or 16 (high) fruit per cm2 of trunk cross-sectional area via bud extinction. Fruit mass, xylem functionality, and peel calcium content were assessed weekly throughout the season. Fruit tissues were frozen weekly to evaluate the expression of genes related to xylogenesis and calcium transport and for quantification of hormones. At maturity, 25 trees were harvested from each crop load treatment. Fruit were assessed for bitter pit, stored for three months in regular air (3⁰C), then reassessed. Crop load influenced both xylem functionality and bitter pit incidence of fruit. Low crop load fruit lost 80% of xylem functionality by 8 weeks after bloom, which was two weeks earlier than moderate crop. By seven and five weeks before harvest, total xylem dysfunction was observed in fruit of low and moderate crop load, respectively; xylem in high crop load fruit never became fully dysfunctional. Final fruit mass from low crop load trees was only 20 grams larger than fruit from moderate crop load trees, yet, these fruit had a roughly 100% increase in bitter pit incidence at harvest (27.3% vs. 12.6%). Only 4.1% of high crop load fruit were affected by bitter pit. Many previous studies have ascribed the positive relationship between fruit mass and bitter pit incidence to calcium dilution. Our data suggest, however, that the issue is one of transport limits that appear to begin very early in fruit development, exacerbated by the growth rate of fruit, resulting in less peel calcium and higher bitter pit incidence at harvest than fruit of relatively lower growth rates. Future analysis of endogenous hormone concentrations and expression of genes relating to xylogenesis and calcium allocation will facilitate a better understanding of the processes governing xylem dysfunction and its association to bitter pit disorder.