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  • WHERE I WORK

Stress testing avocados

Savannah Braden monitors how fruits ripen and rot to reduce food waste.
By
  1. Virginia Gewin

    1. Virginia Gewin is a freelance writer in Portland, Oregon.

Savannah Braden investigates different markers of stress and indicators of shelf life in avocado fruit at Apeel labs.

Savannah Braden is senior biological scientist at Apeel in Goleta, California. Credit: Rocco Ceselin for Nature

My job here at Apeel, a food-systems technology company in Goleta, California, is to unlock how genes and metabolites, or products of food breakdown, control the degradation of fruits such as mango and avocado. The company uses plant-based coatings to double the shelf life of produce and reduce waste from a range of crops — including apples, mangos, cucumbers and citrus fruits.

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Nature 597, 742 (2021)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-02619-y

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