Abstract: The modern lifestyle of consumers and the increase in the consumption of natural products that offer health benefits has led to an increase in the production and demand of fresh fruits and vegetables. The tomato has certain characteristics that make it attractive to health such as its high concentration of bioactive constituents, such as vitamin C, carotenoids, lycopene and polyphenols. The world’s annual agricultural production of fresh tomato is more than 115 million tonnes, making it one of the most important crops in the world. About 50 thousand producers are engaged in the production of this vegetable. The states with the largest contribution are Sinaloa, Sonora, Oaxaca and Jalisco which together contribute with 71.05% of the national production. Currently, these fruits are marketed to points far from their place of origin, which has brought the need to extend their shelf life during the post-harvest stage, where losses range from 25 to 50%, in addition, consumer currently demands high-quality, immediate-consumption products that contain only natural ingredients. Over the years, several techniques have been used to preserve these fruits, with the edible compound casings being the most booming method. New packaging materials have been developed and characterized by some scientists from natural sources; but even though the information available for the production of edible casings is extensive, it is not universal for all products, which poses a challenge for the development of food-specific coatings and films. The objective of this work was to develop an edible coating composed of whey protein, candelilla wax and glycerol to prolong the shelf life of tomato shelf while maintaining the quality of the fruit. It worked with the design and optimization of an edible film that was then applied on tomato of the Saladette variety to evaluate its shelf life for 10 days at room temperature (23 ± 2°C). It was decided to use an additional treatment, where the optimized film was added polyphenolic compounds of Flourensia cernua, in order to evaluate the antifungal and antioxidant potential of the compounds, demonstrated in previous work of the group investigation.

Thesis PhD Olga Berenice Álvarez