Colour is one of the critical factors determining consumer
acceptance on the quality of fruits because it is an indicator of the
degree of freshness, extent of fruit deterioration, even infestation of
disease as well as contamination (Chen et al., 2011). As shown in
Fig. 2, colour was significantly different between control and all
treated groups. In control group, lightness decreased from 62.75 to
46.04, a value increased from 1.16 to 0.26 and b value decreased
from 13.88 to 10.44 during storage, indicating significant browning
process during storage occurred which caused the darkening and
loss of fresh yellow colour of fruits. Treatment effectively delayed
this postharvest browning, indicated by the similar lightness (between
62.75 and 61.85) from day 1 until day 10, and slightly
decreased lightness from day 10 to day 13, as well as slightly
increased a value and similar b value throughout the storage period.
Besides, colour changes among treatments did not vary significantly
within 13 days of storage, indicating similar effectiveness of
the three treatments on delaying colour changes of postharvest
honeydew melon.