Preharvest Elicitors Spray Improves Antioxidant Activity, Alleviates Chilling Injury, and Maintains Quality in Harvested Fruit

Antioxidant activity is an important feature for evaluating fruit quality and tolerance to biotic or abiotic stresses. Moreover, antioxidant activity is involved in chilling injury (CI) response and postharvest quality in fruit. Chemical elicitors can induce systemic acquired resistance in fruit against pathogens, which could partially replace synthetic fungicides. Recently, researchers have found that preharvest sprays with chemical elicitors can improve antioxidant activity, reduce CI, and maintain quality in harvested fruit. In this review, we summarize that preharvest elicitors spray improve antioxidant activity in harvested fruit by promoting antioxidant components biosynthesis as well as antioxidant ability in vitro. Moreover, preharvest elicitors spray alleviates CI in fruit by regulation of membrane lipid metabolism and reactive oxygen species metabolism. In addition, preharvest elicitors spray maintains fruit quality by modulation of respiration and ethylene release. Finally, this review points out the issues existing and proposes an outlook on preharvest elicitors spray to maintain postharvest fruit quality.Keywords:fruit;preharvest elicitor spray;antioxidant activity;chilling injury;postharvest quality