Open Access

ARTICLE

Sandalwood Essential Oil (SEO) Readily Inhibits Colletotrichum gloeosporioides-Mediated Anthracnose in Post-Harvest Stored Mango (Mangifera indica L. cv. ‘Keitt’)

Muhammad Shahzaib^1,2, Shenzhen Wang^1,3, Rundong Yao¹, Sezai Ercisli⁴, Rongxiang Wang¹, Xiaona Fu¹, Hanqing Cong¹, Pingyin Guan³, Xuefei Jiang², Mahmoud F. Seleiman⁵, Yuandi Zhu³, Muhammad Mubashar Zafar^1,2,6,7,*, Fei Qiao^1,6,*

1 Tropical Crops Genetic Resources Institute, Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences; Key Laboratory of Crop Gene Resources and Germplasm Enhancement in Southern China, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Haikou, 571101, China
2 School of Tropical Agriculture and Forestry, Hainan University, Danzhou, 571737, China
3 College of Horticulture, China Agricultural University, Beijing, 100193, China
4 Department of Horticulture, Faculty of Agriculture, Ataturk University, Erzurum, 25240, Turkey
5 Department of Plant Production, College of Food and Agriculture Sciences, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2460, Riyadh, 11451, Saudi Arabia
6 Sanya Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences, Sanya, 572024, China
7 Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics, University of Agriculture Faisalabad, Faisalabad, 38000, Pakistan

* Corresponding Authors: Muhammad Mubashar Zafar. Email: ; Fei Qiao. Email:

(This article belongs to the Special Issue: Innovations in Post-Harvest Disease Control and Quality Preservation of Horticultural Crops)

Phyton-International Journal of Experimental Botany 2025, 94(7), 2167-2181. https://doi.org/10.32604/phyton.2025.065068

Received 03 March 2025; Accepted 25 June 2025; Issue published 31 July 2025

Abstract

Mango (Mangifera indica L. cv. ‘Keitt’) is one of the core fruit delicacies produced by China. During the post-harvest storage span, the fungal pathogen colletotrichum gloeosporioides readily invades the fruits and leads to a significant overall yield loss. In recent years of development, the exploitation of naturally occurring fungitoxic compounds such as Sandalwood Essential Oil (SEO) has been useful in tackling various fungal species. This study demonstrates the potential of SEO as part of a storage protection strategy against C. gloeosporioides-induced post-harvest anthracnose. SEO displayed a relatively higher mycelial growth inhibition rate when compared to various other essential oils. Furthermore, the Minimal Inhibitory Concentration (MIC), Minimum Fungicidal Concentration (MFC), and EC₅₀ (Half maximal effective concentration) of SEO were determined to be 2000, 2500, and 610.38 µL/L, respectively. Moreover, the chitosan glutamate-SEO emulsion controlled the anthracnose spread for several days by multiple folds at ½ MIC, MIC, and 2 MIC concentrations. These results strongly support the potential for large-scale production and application of SEO emulsions by agrochemical firms and post-harvest storage facilities handling Keitt mangoes.

---

Keywords

---

Supplementary Material

Supplementary Material File

---