Determinants of Fruit Development and Ripening

Dear Colleagues,

The open access journal Horticulturae (IF: 2.923; Q1 in Horticulture) is pleased to announce a new Special Issue titled “Determinants of Fruit Development and Ripening”. Given your expertise in this field, we would like to invite you to contribute an article to the present Special Issue.

Fruit development involves a myriad of genetically coordinated processes making the fruit more attractive for seed-dispersing organisms and suitable for human consumption. The last step of fruit development culminates in the ripe-fruit stage, in which the fruit experiences extensive physiological and molecular changes. This group of events involves many metabolic pathways and all cellular compartments, requiring a differential expression program of genes regulated by environmental conditions, phytohormones and transcription factors. In fact, fleshy fruit development and ripening is a particular plant program wherein phytohormones command several processes involving the regulation of the expression of key transcription factors related to primary and secondary metabolism, leading to biochemical changes (e.g., cell wall modification) and the accumulation of compounds of interest for fruit quality (sugars, organic acids, flavonoids, carotenoids, fatty acids and esters, among others).

The aim of this Special Issue is to explore the core genes and key factors affecting the fruit development and ripening processes to form an improved understanding of how those genes and environmental factors contribute to the relative trait of fruit quality during fruit development.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

• Physiological regulation of the ripening process.
• Quality formation of the fruits (e.g., flavor, nutrients, pigment accumulation, and texture traits).
• Functional identification of key genes regulating fruit quality.
• Relative factors affecting the fruit quality during the development process, including environmental factors and hormonal changes.

Dr. Luis Morales-Quintana
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Horticulturae is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2200 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• fruit and vegetable development
• fruit ripening
• fruit quality
• plant hormones
• metabolites
• transcription factors
• gene expression
• regulation mechanism