Headspace gaseous composition and Respiration rate
Headspace gases (O2 and CO2) were measured every day with a
headspace gas analyser (Checkmate 9900, PBI Dansensor Co.,
Denmark) by drawing up 2 ml of air samples. Sampling took
place with a hypodermic needle through a septum pasted on
the packaging film. The CO2 and O2 production rate of
unpackaged control chillies was measured by placing the
chillies in an air tight container (PET jar) and the changes in the
head space were measured using a PBI Dansensor CO2/O2
analyzer (Manolopoulou et al., 2012). For determining the
respiration rate, concentration of CO2 inside the packets was
checked at every 1 min intervals over a period of 2 h and
respiration rate was calculated from the regression slope of
CO2 concentration versus time data and evaluated as mg
CO2 kg1 h1 (Maftoonazad & Ramaswamy, 2005).