ABSTRACT
Asian pears are also known as Japanese, Chinese, Oriental, sand, and apple pears. Asian pears reach optimum quality when allowed to ripen on the tree, developing a crisp and juicy texture with some tartness in taste, especially near the core. The Chinese cultivars are more oval or pyriform than pear-shaped, while Japanese cultivars tend to be more rounded in shape. Asian pears, also known as apple pears, are crisp and juicy like apples, but with the sweetness associated with pears. Optimal fruit quality can only be reached by harvesting the fruit at the proper stage of maturity. Internal browning (IB) can manifest as different browning patterns and can lead to the appearance of cavities in the cortex of the fruit. The development of non-destructive methods to detect internal diseases has led to the application of gas chromatography–mass spectrometry for the detection of volatile organic compounds from fruit with IB symptoms.
