1663 Postharvest Behavior of New Mandarin Cultivars Obtained in the IVIA Sawsen Sdiri 1 , Pilar Navarro 1 , Jose Cuenca 2 , Jose Pardo 3 and Alejandra Salvador 1,* 1 Centro de Tecnología Postcosecha, Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Agrarias (IVIA), Valencia, Spain 2 Centro de Protección Vegetal y Biotecnología, IVIA, Valencia, Spain 3 Centro de Citricultura y Producción Vegetal, IVIA, Valencia, Spain *Corresponding author: salvador_ale@gva.es Abstract A triploid breeding program has been carried out in Plant Protection and Biotechnology Center at the Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Agrarias (IVIA) based on sexual hybridization, embryo rescue and ploidy analysis by flow cytometry in order to obtain new mandarin cultivars with late harvest. ‘Safor’ and ‘Garbí’ mandarins are new triploid hybrids recently released characterized by their high quality and seedless fruits. In the Citrus Center and Vegetable Production (IVIA) another breeding program based on budwood irradiation is being conducted in search of new seedless cultivars. At this moment two clones obtained from irradiated budwood of the seedy ‘Moncada’ mandarin (Moncalina-6S17 and Manrad-2L09) are in process of being registered and exhibit excellent fruit quality. This study aimed at testing the postharvest behavior of these four new cultivars. After harvest the fruit were waxed and stored up to 30 days at 1, 5, or 9°C in order to evaluate the sensibility to chilling injury and the changes in quality parameters that occur during the cold storage. ‘Safor’ mandarins did not show chilling injury symptoms during 30 days at any temperature studied. In contrast, ‘Garbi’ mandarins exhibited susceptibility to chilling injury after 15 days of storage at 1 and 5°C; during this period this cultivar showed disorders related with peel dehydration when stored at 9°C. ‘Moncalina’ and ‘Manrad’ did not show relevant symptoms related to cold- induced damage or dehydration at 1, 5 and 9°C for 30 days of storage. For all mandarin cultivars assayed, the storage at low temperature was not limited for the changes observed in fruit quality parameters. Keywords: ‘Garbí’, ‘Safor’, ‘Moncalina’, manrad, cold storage, chilling injury INTRODUCTION Citrus is one of the most important commercial fruit crops in a large number of countries in tropical and subtropical climates. The worldwide production was estimated at over 100 million tons in 2009, in which 21 million tons being mandarins, clementines and satsumas (FAO, 2009). Spain is the leading producing country in the Mediterranean area and is the second world producer of mandarins. In addition, it is the first world exporting country of fresh mandarin, especially for the northern European countries and for the USA (MAGRAMA, 2012). In Spain seedless fruits, such as Satsumas and Clementines, are traditionally harvested from the beginning of September until mid February. Although mandarin hybrids are harvested until May, they produce fruits with seeds which cause substantial economic losses. The lack of seedless mandarin production after February and the steady increase in consumption and demand for these sweet fruits leads to find new cultivars to supply the market, mainly in the period from February to May. Since 1996, a breeding program has been carried out in the Plant Protection and Biotechnology Center in the Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Agrarias (IVIA) located at Moncada (Valencia, Spain), in order to obtain new triploid mandarin cultivars with late harvest (Navarro et al., 2005). From this program, ‘Safor’ and ‘Garbí’ mandarins are new triploid hybrids recently released (Navarro et al., 2005). Both cultivars are characterized by their high quality and seedless fruits. ‘Safor’ mandarin, obtained from a cross between ‘Fortune’ mandarin (Citrus clementina Hort. ex Tan. × C. tangerina Hort. Proc. XII th Intl. Citrus Congress Eds.: B. Sabater-Muñoz et al. Acta Hort. 1065, ISHS 2015