amino groups, and SSP and calcium ions from calcium salt (Chen
et al., 2011; Goy et al., 2009). The AFM results provided direct evidence
that the addition of calcium ions and chitosan was able to
maintain and improve firmness by crosslinking pectin molecules
together, strengthening the interaction and chemical bonding between
pectin molecules, and thus preventing fruit texture degradation
(Qi et al., 2011). Therefore, we hypothesised that the
physicochemical properties, especially firmness information of
fruits are correlated with cell wall polysacchardies tested by AFM.
This correlation provides an even better approach on studying the
effect of edible coating on fruit characteristics.