Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 March 2013
Introduction. India is thelargest producer of pomegranate in the world, with rich geneticdiversity. The wide range of utility of pomegranate in human health,nutrition and livelihood security has triggered its heavy demandin India and other countries. At present, more than 300 germplasmaccessions from indigenous and exotic sources are available in India,but meagre information on the physico-chemical properties of their fruitsis available. In our study, the physico-chemical properties of varietiesgrown under a semi-arid climate were investigated. Materialsand methods. Our study was carried out at the experimentalfarm of the National Research Centre on Pomegranate, Solapur, India,during the harvests of 2008–2009 and 2009–2010. Twenty pomegranatevarieties were studied with respect to the physico-chemical propertiesof their fruits. Results and discussion. A considerablevariation (coefficient of variation: 3.37% to 101.13%) was observedwith respect to the 16 characters studied. The values ranged from 12.64 °Brixto 15.39 °Brix for TSS; 0.38% to 3.40% for acidity; 16.67 g to 27.82 gfor 100-aril weight; 4.31-38.62 for the maturity index; 59.22% to 77.40%for aril percentage; and 43.30% to 61.00% for juice percentage. Fruitsize, rind weight, total aril weight, 100-aril weight, juice weight andaril width were found to have a strong positive correlation (P < 0.01) withfruit weight. Based on the total index score obtained, the varieties ‘BasseinSeedless’, ‘Dholka’, ‘Ganesh’, ‘Jyoti’, ‘Kandhari’, ‘KRS’, ‘Mridula’and ‘P-13’ were found to be suitable for processing and table purposes.