Biodiversity in a Tomato Germplasm for Free Amino Acid and Pigment Content of Ripening Fruits

摘要: Free amino acid and pigment composition in fruits at two ripening stages from a selected tomato germplasm was stu-died. The aims were contributing to knowledge on variability of metabolism identifying more consis-tently the genetic background plant material under analysis. Significant differences (p < 0.05) found among genotypes within stage for all acids pigments except by asparagine, alanine chlorophyll b contents. highest relative content corresponded glutamate, glutamine, GABA though some had relatively high asparagine content. Glutamate, glutamine performed oppositely: former increased along while latter decreased their A Principal Components (PC) analysis applied, determining that metabolites having greatest contribution general threonine, serine, glycine, isoleucine, leucine, tyrosine, phenylalanine, lycopene beta- carotene, which showed association with PC1. Alanine chlorophylls highly associated PC2. These first PC explained 62% total variation, distributed according coordinates. Accordingly, Hierarchical Clustering resulted dendrogram cophenetic correlation (0.70), well defined groups obtained stage. results verified existence fruit pigments, allowed identify unequivocally set metabolic profiles these stages.