Comparative study on chemical components of Gannan navel orange in different maturity stages based on UPLC-QTOF-MS metabolomics

• Published in: Food chemistry advances 2023-12, Vol.3, p.100472, Article 100472
• Main Authors: Hou, Jinxue, Yuan, Yi, Wang, Yuanxing
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Flavonoids; Maturity; Metabolomics; Navel orange; UPLC-QTOF-MS
• ISSN: 2772-753X; 2772-753X
• DOI: 10.1016/j.focha.2023.100472

•A deeper analysis of changes in compounds during navel oranges growth is conducted.•A total of 63 metabolites were identified during navel orange growth by UPLC-QTOF/MS.•Flavonoids were main differential metabolites, exhibiting high correlation.•KEGG highlighted the flavonoid biosynthes was a major pathway.•The inhibition rate of α-glucosidase activity exhibited ongoing reduction. Metabolites changes during fruit growth are currently being studied intensively. In this experiment, Ultra-high performance liquid chromatography tandem quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry was used to identify metabolites during the growing phase of navel oranges. A total of 63 metabolites were identified, and monitored changes in amino acid content. Principal component analysis and Partial least-squares-discriminate analysis were used to construct a cluster analysis model among navel orange metabolites. Among the 19 differential metabolites, flavonoids were the main metabolic markers during the growth of navel oranges. Correlation cluster analysis was used to fit the correlation between the characteristic components, and it was found that many flavonoids were highly correlated. Finally, combined with Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes enrichment analysis, the key metabolic pathway was identified as flavonoid synthesis. The α-glucosidase inhibition experiment showed that with the growth of navel orange, the inhibition rate of the metabolites to α-glucosidase activity decreased continuously. This study provides a necessary basis for exploring the metabolic mechanism of navel orange growth.