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The influence of storage conditions on various properties of potatoes

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Abstract

Change in weight and, to a lesser degree, in specific gravity of tubers during storage was much more dependent on relative humidity than on temperature. Katahdin usually lost more weight and showed a greater increase in specific gravity than Russet Burbank. The increase in weight loss of cured tubers in the course of the storage period was nearly always linear. The increase in specific gravity was often particularly pronounced at the end of the storage period.

Black spot susceptibility decreased during the storage season and was sometimes affected by temperatures as well as relative humidity. In the cases that these influences were significant, colder and drier storage conditions resulted in less susceptible tubers than higher temperatures and relative humidities, but the differences were small. In one year out of three Russet Burbank was more susceptible than Katahdin, once the opposite was true, and once there was no difference between them.

Susceptibility to damage, which decreased during the storage period in two out of three years, was greater at lower temperatures and higher humidities than under warmer or drier storage conditions. Variety differences were not consistent.

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Paper No. 617, Dept. of Vegetable Crops, Cornell University, Ithaca, N. Y. 14850.

This work was supported by Hatch funds (Project 267).

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Schippers, P.A. The influence of storage conditions on various properties of potatoes. American Potato Journal 48, 234–245 (1971). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02861589

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02861589

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