Researchers at the Department of Horticulture and Landscape Studies at Purdue University in the United States recently published a study on the use of LED lighting to cultivate tomatoes in greenhouses, providing some new information on the feasibility of LED lighting in horticultural applications.

To meet the growing consumer demand for local and non-season growing, greenhouse tomato growers often have to rely on supplemental lighting. More and more tomato growers are optimistic about LED, because LED has more potential for energy saving, and can replace HPS in the greenhouse environment.

Michael Dzakovich, researcher at Purdue University's Department of Horticulture and Landscape Studies, Celina Gomez and Cary Mitchell, published an auxiliary lighting experiment in a recent issue of HortScience Horticultural Journal. "There is a general strong interest in how LED lighting can affect the phytochemicals and flavors of a wide variety of high-value crops," the researchers said. "However, so far, it has been rare to see LED lights growing long enough to produce tomato fruits Related research on quality characteristics. "

Researchers conducted three separate studies, respectively, to investigate the effects of supplemental light quantity and quality on greenhouse tomato use. The growth of tomato plants used natural sunlight (control group), natural sunlight + assistive illumination by HPS, and natural sunlight + auxiliary lighting by LED lighthouse. Researchers collected the color, Brix, titratable acidity, conductivity and pH measurements of tomato plants and analyzed the crop's lighting response. The authors of the study report said, "The result is contrary to our hypothesis that fruit quality is almost never directly affected by LED-assisted lighting sources."

The study also adopted a sensory evaluation method, which was subjectively divided into five levels according to the color, the acidity and the sweetness of tomato, and the color, flavor, sweetness, acidity and aftertaste of tomato. . "By collecting physicochemical and sensorial data, we were able to determine whether the statistically significant physicochemical parameters of tomato fruit actually reflect the consumer's perception of the quality of the fruit," the researchers said. The panel of sensory scorers said that for them the physicochemical differences between the three groups of fruit were not obvious; in fact, the test taker could hardly distinguish between tomatoes with different auxiliary lighting settings or control tomatoes without auxiliary lighting different.

"According to the study, the fruit quality of greenhouse tomatoes is not affected by the use of two different types of auxiliary lighting and auxiliary lighting itself," the researchers said. "The results of physicochemical measurements also show that under different lighting conditions The fruits were only slightly different, and the test taker also confirmed that the differences were almost indistinguishable and more supportive of the findings. "

The researchers said the results are expected to reduce greenhouse energy consumption among growers interested in growing tomatoes.

The researchers emphasize that "the LED-assisted lighting used in this study will not adversely affect the quality of tomato fruits grown in tempera- ture in terms of intensity or wavelength, but it also demonstrates the potential of LED lighting as a supplement such as HPS Alternative lighting. "

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