Abstract: Moso bamboo shoots were pretreated with ozone water (OW) or ozone gas (OG) and then stored under modified atmosphere packaging (MAP) in order to investigate the effect of the combination of ozone water/gas and MAP (OW + MAP and OG + MAP) on the preservation of bamboo shoots. Changes in decay incidence, crude fiber content, hardness, polyphenol oxidase (PPO) activity and peroxidase (POD) activity during storage at 4 ℃ were monitored. The results showed that the decay incidence, crude fiber content, and hardness of the untreated bamboo shoots increased significantly during storage. After 28 days storage, the decay incidence was 60%, and the crude fiber content and hardness increased by 116.87% and 118.82%, respectively. Compared with the untreated control group, MAP, OW + MAP and OG + MAP could effectively delay the decay and hardening of bamboo shoots, and inhibit PPO and POD activities. Treatment with 9 μL/L OG for 40 min) combined with MAP had the best preservation effect on bamboo shoots; the lowest decay incidence of 15% was observed on day 28, accompanied by an increase in crude fiber content of only 22.69%. It was found that the ozone pretreatment showed a good effect on the preservation of bamboo shoots, with OG being more effective better than OW. Therefore, pretreatment with OG could effectively extend the storage period of bamboo shoots.

Key words: bamboo shoots; ozone treatment; modified atmosphere packaging; preservation