Study on the Post-Harvest Physical and Chemical Characteristics of Apricot (Prunus Armeniaca L.) in Peshawar

Physical and chemical properties of four apricot varieties viz., Travett, Palumella, Charmaghz and Badami, fruits were presented in this study. Information about these properties is very important for understanding the behavior of the product during the post harvest operations such as harvesting, transporting, sorting, packing and storage processes. The mean value of fruit length, width, thickness, weight, volume, pulp weight, kernel weight were established between 40.36-31.19mm, 36.17-26.76mm, 32,20-26.16mm, 30.63-23.83g, 29.53-22.10cm³, 29.91-22.20g, 2.63-1.63g, respectively. The chemical properties which include TSS was found in range of 11.27-9.43, total sugar 11.21-8.75%, reducing sugar 2.43-1.65%, non-reducing sugar 7.35-6.32 and titratable acidity 1.60-1.12%. Therefore, based on physical (quality) properties varieties Palumella and Charmaghz were found superior, whereas in chemical properties varieties Badami and Travett were the best among the tested varieties. Keywords: Apricot (Prunus armeniaca L), Apricot, physical and chemical properties, Pakistan