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CapitalPress.com
August 12, 2016
People & Places
Keeping apples fresh in storage
Jim Mattheis
develops a game
changing protocol
for industry
Western
Innovator
Capital Press
Paradigm shift
Extending the quality and
shelf life of apples by using
1-MCP has represented a
“paradigm shift” as signif-
icant to the industry as the
development of controlled-at-
mosphere storage in the 1960s,
Jim McFerson, director of the
Washington State University
Tree Fruit Research and Exten-
sion Center, has said.
No one can really pinpoint
how much, but it’s safe to say
it’s added millions of dollars
in grower returns since wide-
spread usage began in 2004.
AgroFresh Inc. of Spring
House, Pa., released it commer-
cially as SmartFresh in 2002.
“Jim and his program team
have not only been world lead-
ers in developing robust ap-
proaches to using SmartFresh
technology, but have consis-
tently kept our Paciic North-
west tree fruit industry on the
cutting edge of technological
innovations in fruit handling
and storage that enhance our
ability to deliver the consumer
a consistently superior eating
experience,” McFerson said.
As the laboratory’s leader
Jim Mattheis
Age: 59
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Born: Sioux Falls, S.D.
Raised: Lennox, S.D.
Family: Wife, Darcee, is
a social worker. Their son,
Carl, 21, is training to be-
come an aircraft mechanic.
Education: Bachelor’s
degree in biology, Augustana
College, Sioux Falls, S.D.,
1979; master’s degree in
public health, University of
Minnesota, 1981; doctorate
in horticulture, Washington
State University, 1987.
Dan Wheat/Capital Press
Jim Mattheis, plant physiologist at the USDA Agriculture Research Service Tree Fruit Research
Laboratory in Wenatchee, Wash., removes a sample of ethylene gas from the core of an apple. Over
20 years, Mattheis has developed the use of a synthetic molecule that inhibits ethylene to keep apples
fresh longer.
for 14 years, Mattheis has guid-
ed it to a “pre-eminent position
in tree fruit physiology and soil-
borne diseases,” he said.
Mattheis works well with
the industry and the “industry
would not be the same without
his work,” McFerson said.
Mattheis oversees four other
scientists and a support staff of
32 graduate students, post doc-
toral researchers and visiting
scientists.
Roots of research
“1-MCP is a product of a
really long period of funda-
mental plant science research
that started in the 1960s,”
Mattheis said.
Ed Sisler, a biochemist
at North Carolina State Uni-
versity, began studying how
growth and development are
regulated in plants. He was
interested in ethylene, a nat-
ural compound produced by
plants, that causes fruit ma-
turity and ripening. It’s often
produced as a protection in
response to stress such as that
caused by a wound.
“He was testing a lot of
different compounds that had
some sort of similarity to eth-
ylene to see if he could pro-
mote or block responses to
ethylene,” Mattheis said.
Sisler and his colleague,
Sylvia Blankenship, a horti-
culturist at NC State, identi-
ied 1-MCP as an inhibitor of
various ethylene responses in
plants.
Mattheis had spent his
irst 10 years at the ARS Tree
Fruit Research Laboratory in
Wenatchee developing con-
trolled-atmosphere storage
regimens for new apple va-
rieties such as Gala, Fuji and
Braeburn. He was interested
in postharvest environmental
factors impacting apple aro-
ma. He determined that eth-
ylene is important to aroma
and was interested in the NC
State indings.
“Sylvia had been working
in apples so we were both in-
terested in studying 1-MCP
with apples and collaborated
on work beginning in March
1997,” Mattheis said.
Xuetong Fan, a post-doc-
toral scientist on Mattheis’
staff, did most of the labora-
tory work. Mattheis and Blan-
kenship published a joint pa-
per on their indings in 1999
— the irst regarding 1-MCP
and apples.
What 1-MCP does
SmartFresh is applied as
a non-toxic gas shortly after
apples enter controlled-atmo-
sphere storage, biodegrades
and is gone shortly after ap-
plication. It is highly effective
at low concentrations.
Treatment maintains apple
acids, retaining lavor, irm-
ness and freshness. A residu-
al effect of delayed ripening
can last several weeks after
fruit is taken from storage and
shipped to retailers.
Studies of apples in gro-
cery stores in 2007 by Eugene
Kupferman, a postharvest
specialist at the WSU Tree
Fruit Research and Extension
Center, showed SmartFresh
actually increases the irm-
ness of apples during the sales
season.
1-MCP is also effective in
preventing supericial scald,
which is a browning of apple
skin. By delaying ripening,
1-MCP also delays several in-
ternal browning disorders re-
lated to ripening such as core
browning in Granny Smith
apples, Mattheis said.
In the last several years,
a ield formulation of Smart-
Fresh has been used in or-
chards to manage harvest
timing by delaying it and to
prevent premature apple drop.
“It prevents premature
drop, slows maturation and
can be applied close to har-
vest. Other materials only
prevent drop without slowing
maturation,” Mattheis said.
On the downside, 1-MCP
can lengthen the amount of
time fruit is susceptible to
carbon dioxide injury such
as skin and internal browning
and rough skin. To reduce that
threat, carbon dioxide can be
aggressively removed from
storage atmosphere and con-
trolled-atmosphere storage
can be delayed after 1-MCP
treatment. Delay of 1-MCP is
a strategy for some varieties.
1-MCP does not meet re-
quirements for organic fruit,
which relies on low oxy-
gen concentrations in con-
trolled-atmosphere for best
storage.
Ongoing research
In recent years, packers
and shippers have begun us-
ing ozone to combat bacteria
and external decay on fruit
in storage. Depending on the
concentration, ozone can in-
activate ethylene and slow
ripening. It can be used with
1-MCP or in place of it.
Mattheis is in his 19th year
of 1-MCP research. He is the
main scientist in Washing-
ton working on apple storage
regimens. He re-tweaks those
regimens, including use of
1-MCP, for various apple va-
rieties to it new technologies.
An example is making the
regimen for Honeycrisp it
with a relatively new tech-
nology that measures fruit
response to controlled-atmo-
sphere storage.
“It used to be a warehouse
would impose (controlled at-
mosphere) and hope it works.
Occupation, work history:
Plant physiologist, USDA
Agriculture Research
Service Tree Fruit Research
Laboratory, Wenatchee,
Wash., since 1988; labora-
tory research leader since
2002.
By JANAE SARGENT
Capital Press
Janae Sargent/Capital Press
Mikaela Bruer shows off her
goat at her family’s property in
Dallas, Ore.
alpacas at the Polk County Fair
on Aug. 11.
Bruer lives on her family
property that was started by her
great-great-grandfather. Her
dream is to study veterinary
medicine at Cornell Universi-
ty and become a large-animal
veterinarian that specializes in
dairy animals.
Bruer said she has a deep
love for animals and pageantry
and she loves being an example
of how the two can go together.
In addition to being Miss
Oregon Teen USA and compet-
ing in pageants, Bruer is in 4-H,
FFA and is a model and a com-
petitive golfer and archer. She
maintains above a 4.0 grade-
point average.
She said she uses her po-
sition in the spotlight to break
down stereotypes about the ag-
riculture industry and pageant-
ry and show how the things she
does overlap.
“Pageantry and agriculture
both have stereotypes that go
with them,” Bruer said. “I want
to show people no matter which
side of the spectrum you’re on,
they can go together.”
Bruer got her start in 4-H
when she was 9 years old,
following her mother, Denise
McCormick, who raised sheep
when growing up.
She started with horticulture
and cooking but quickly fell in
love with animals and got her
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Now there are several ways,
two in real-time, to measure
response to low oxygen in
particular,” he said.
Six years ago, his regi-
men to lengthen Honeycrisp
storage was to hold the fruit
for one week after harvest at
50 degrees and then drop it
to 36 degrees while keeping
carbon dioxide at 1 percent or
less and oxygen at 2 percent.
That enabled storage for nine
months.
Three years ago, Mattheis
found that if Honeycrisp is
treated with 1-MCP at 50 de-
grees it reduces bitter pit but
if controlled atmosphere is
turned on bitter pit is reduced
even more.
That hadn’t been done be-
cause fruit tends to have more
problems with low oxygen
the higher the temperature
is. To assess whether Honey-
crisp has a problem with low
oxygen at 50 degrees, Mat-
theis will be using a pulse of
light to measure chlorophyll
luorescence in fruit skin. If
it’s too low the oxygen level
needs to be raised.
The research goes on. It
has been fulilling.
“When I went to gradu-
ate school and learned about
fruit development, matu-
ration and ripening, this
wasn’t something I antici-
pated,” Mattheis said. “You
can do a lot of great science
and no one really benefits.
But there’s been a great ben-
efit from 1-MCP.”
Miss Oregon Teen USA at home on the farm
Mikaela Bruer says she is
using her title as Miss Oregon
Teen USA to educate and in-
spire young people about agri-
culture.
The 17-year-old from Dal-
las, Ore., competed in the Miss
Teen USA pageant in Las Ve-
gas, Nev., on July 29-30 where
she placed 16th.
Though most contestants re-
turned home and began wind-
ing down from the chaos of the
national pageant, Bruer started
prepping to show her goats,
dairy cows, market steer and
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By DAN WHEAT
WENATCHEE, Wash. —
When Jim Mattheis was a boy
in Lennox, S.D., he was curi-
ous about his friend’s family’s
orchard: It didn’t produce any
apples.
It wasn’t a commercial or-
chard. It was just a small, home
orchard that had been neglect-
ed for years. The trees hadn’t
been pruned or sprayed. Spring
frosts took their toll. Finding an
apple was a novelty.
The orchard didn’t bear
much fruit but it did spawn an
interest in horticulture in young
Mattheis. Half a century later,
Mattheis, now 59, is regarded
as a transformative innovator
by the apple industry.
As a plant physiologist and
research leader at the USDA
Agriculture Research Service
Tree Fruit Research Laborato-
ry, Mattheis has been the key
igure in the testing and devel-
opment of the synthetic mol-
ecule 1-methylcyclopropene
— also called 1-MCP — which
slows the ripening of apples
to keep them fresher longer in
storage. Industry packers and
shippers worldwide have used
it for 12 years, and Mattheis
keeps reining best practices for
new technologies and new ap-
ple varieties.
Capital Press
irst Norwegian dwarf goats
when she was 12.
Her start in pageants was
less conventional. McCormick
said she started Bruer in pag-
eants when she was 6 to en-
courage her out of her shell and
get used to public speaking and
making connections.
“I was painfully shy when I
was a kid,” McCormick said. “I
just wanted to start her young
and teach her to be more out-
going.”
Bruer started going to one
pageant a year but quickly fell
in love with pageantry and be-
gan traveling the world to com-
pete and model.
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Index
Calendar
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Community Events calendar on the
home page of our website at www.
capitalpress.com and click on “Sub-
mit an Event.” Calendar items can
also be mailed to Capital Press, 1400
Broadway St. NE, Salem, OR 97301.
Saturday and Sunday
Aug. 13-14
Harvest Fest, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.
Yamhill Valley Heritage Center,
11275 SW Durham Lane, McMin-
nville, Ore. Threshing, binding
and baling oats using vintage farm
equipment, horses and mules; “Pa-
rade of Power” tractor parade at 1
p.m. each day; pioneer kids’ activ-
ities, pedal tractors and petting an-
imals. $5 admission, kids under 12
are free. www.yamhillcountyhistory.
org
Oregon Cannabis Growers Fair,
10 a.m.-4 p.m., Oregon State Fair-
grounds, 2330 17th St. NE, Salem.
Over age 21 only. https://oregon-
cannabisgrowersfair.com/
Tuesday, Aug. 16
Oregon Soil and Water Com-
mission Meeting, 8:30 a.m.-12:30
p.m. Hilton Garden Inn, 3528
Gateway St., Springield, Ore.
www.oregon.gov/ODA/programs/
NaturalResources/SWCD/Pages/
SWCC.aspx
GASES / WELDING / SAFETY / FIRE
www.oxarc.com
Tuesday-Thursday
Aug. 16-18
Practical Food Safety & HAC-
CP Workshop. This is a compre-
hensive, three-day workshop,
designed for those individuals
responsible for implementing and
managing a HACCP system in a
food manufacturing facility. Partic-
ipants who pass a final test will re-
ceive a certificate of completion.
Idaho Water Center, 322 E. Front
St., Boise, Idaho. Cost: $650.
www.techhelp.org/events/273/
practical-food-safety-haccp-work-
shop-august-16-18-in-boise/
20 Northwest Locations
Friday, Aug. 19
8th Annual Friends of Oregon
Agriculture Golf Tournament.
This annual fund-raiser for Or-
egon Aglink’s Adopt-a-Farmer
program includes the popular
golf ball drop. Chehalem Glenn
Golf Course, Newberg, Ore.
www.aglink.org
Western Idaho Fair, 5610
Glenwood, Boise, 208-287-
5650, http://sharemyfair.com/
Saturday, Aug. 20
Oregon Aglink Barn Dance,
6:30-10:30 p.m. Celebrating Or-
egon Aglink’s 50th anniversary.
1-800-765-9055
Victor Point Farms, Silverton,
Ore. Cost: $50 www.aglink.
org
Western Idaho Fair, 5610
Glenwood, Boise, 208-287-5650,
http://sharemyfair.com/
Sunday, Aug. 21
Western Idaho Fair, 5610 Glen-
wood, Boise, 208-287-5650, http://
sharemyfair.com/
Monday, Aug. 22
Western Idaho Fair, 5610 Glen-
wood, Boise, 208-287-5650, http://
sharemyfair.com/
Dairy .....................................11
GE Wheat ............................... 7
Markets ............................... 13
Opinion .................................. 6
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