Fruit growing
and viticulture of South Russia

Annotation

Courgettes and scallop squash are quite important vegetable crops in the Russian Federation. For the period 2000-2020 gross yields of courgettes and scallop squash in farms of all categories increased by 10.5 %, in the commercial sector (agricultural organizations and peasant/farm enterprises) � by 95.4 %. However, as objects of storage, the fruits of these crops are distinguished by thin integumentary tissues, low water-holding capacity, high respiration rate, and vulnerability to microbiological deterioration. Further complicating the organization of their storage is the fact that courgettes and scallop squash are thermophilic and get damaged by low temperature. Thus, the creation of technologies to control the loss of courgettes and scallop squash is relevant. The purpose of this work was mathematical modeling of the processes of natural weight loss of fresh courgettes during storage and the development of software for predicting losses. As objects of study, a hybrid of courgettes Iskander F1 was used. The courgettes were stored for 10 days under various conditions: the temperature varied from 7 to 15 ºC, relative air humidity - from 55 to 95 %. At the end of storage, the mass of research objects was determined. As a result of the conducted work, the dependence of the natural weight loss during storage of courgettes on such parameters as temperature and relative air humidity was revealed. The established dependence made it possible to create a mathematical model and develop software based on it, designed to predict the amount of losses depending on the aforementioned parameters. The developed application llows to optimize the storage parameters of courgettes in order to reduce losses and maximize the duration of their storage.