Comprehensive evaluation of the Fruit Quality of the Main Cultivars of Pear (Pyrus spp.) in North China

To establish a quality evaluation system of the fruit quality of pear, 15 evaluation indicators of 9 main cultivars of pear (Pyrus spp.) in North China were analyzed. Analysis of variance (ANOVA), correlation analysis (CA), principal component analysis (PCA) and hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) were used to form a comprehensive evaluation model and select the characteristic indicators of the fruit quality. All of the 15 evaluation indicators showed significant differences from the results of ANOVA (P?<?0.05) among different cultivars. The values for coefficient of variation (CV) among 15 evaluation indicators ranged from 1.46% to 326.38%. There were different degrees of correlations between the evaluation indicators based on the results of CA. PCA was used to remove the overlapped information between the indicators, and then there were new variables with less information, so that the principal component comprehensive model was established. The rank of the 9 cultivars based on comprehensive scores of the fruit quality was listed as follows: ‘Mili’?>?‘Xuehua’?>?‘Hongxiangsu’?>?‘Daguoxing’?>?‘Yali’?>?‘Huangguan’?>?‘Yuluxiang’?>?‘Hongxiaoli’?>?‘Anli’. By combining HCA and principal component comprehensive model, titratable acid content, sugar-acid ratio, h^* and fruit shape index were selected to be the characteristic indicators for the evaluation of the fruit quality of the main cultivars of pear in North China.