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Plums have a limited postharvest life due to their elevated rate of ripening and because they can develop chilling injury after long cold storage, even when stored at optimal temperatures (0°C ± 0.5°C). Flesh browning and flesh translucency are the main symptoms and the susceptibility depends on the cultivar and storage temperature (Crisosto . 1999).

‘Blanquilla’ pear () has delicious fragrance and flavour and represents an important produce for Spanish retailers. Although refrigeration can be used to prolong its storage, fruit ripens very quickly, even during cold storage, and therefore has a limited commercial life. This fruit is also very sensitive to mechanical bruising and can develop scald during long-term storage. In order to eliminate these specific problems, fruit were treated with 1-MCP and kept in air storage during 4 months. In general, in these conditions the fruit remain evergreen and the ripening process is blocked (Bai 2006, Trinchero . 2004). To solve this problem, combined treatments that mixed 1-MCP treatment and heat treatment to induce ripening were assayed.

Ethylene (C2H4) is a plant hormone involved in many aspects of the plant life cycle, as well as in the plants response to many environmental stimuli. Over the years the laser-based detectors have been used for online monitoring of ethylene production in various processes in plants and microorganisms, such as germination (Petruzzelli ., 1995; Thuring ., 1994), growth, flower and fruit development, senescence of plant organs (Woltering ., 1993; Wagstaff ., 2005), programmed cell death, plant defense, biotic stress (e.g. pathogen attack) (Cristescu . 2002) and abiotic stress conditions (e.g. wounding, hypoxia, drought, heat, chill- ing and freezing) (Leprince , 2000), interaction with auxin (Van der Bussche ., 2003), circadian rhythm (Thain , 2004), nitrogen fixation by cyanobacteria (Staal ., 2003), etc.

Plants expressing the bacterial gene from promoters of different strength and tissue specificity can be used as a good genetic tool to manipulate the endogenous auxin levels and study the involvement of the hormone in different physiological responses (Romano ., 1993; Mezzeti ., 2004).

Seedling establishment is one of the most important agronomic traits in direct seeding rice cultivation. It has been considered that plant growth regulators (PGRs), such as gibberellin (GA) and ethylene, have promotive effects on rice seedling organs (Takahashi and Kaufman, 1983).