Off-season strawberry production may diversify the yield, thereby increasing costs, but the environmental conditions are a limiting factor. This experiment aimed to study the effects of vernalization on off-season flowering and gene expression in sub-tropical strawberry cv. Pharachatan 80. The factorial (2 × 2) + 1 in a completely randomized design was used in this study. Factor A was the vernalization temperatures: 2 °C and 4 °C. Factor B was the vernalization periods: 1 week and 2 weeks, compared with non-vernalization (control). The expression profile of genes was determined after vernalization treatments. The results revealed an interaction between the two factors on the number of days it took the plants to bloom, the percentage of flowering, the number of inflorescences, the number of flowers per inflorescence and the number of flowers per plant, whereas the number of first flower bloom days, inflorescence length and flower size were not affected by the interaction between the two factors. Strawberry plants vernalized for 1 and 2 weeks at 2 °C showed earlier flowering (21.4 and 23.1 days, respectively) than did those vernalized at 4 °C (24.9 and 25.7 days, respectively). On the other hand, non-vernalized strawberry plants took longer to bloom, at 62.2 days. Strawberry plants vernalized at 2 °C for 2 weeks had the highest percentage of flowering, number of inflorescences, number of flowers per inflorescence and number of flowers per plant. The analysis on gene expression showed that VRN5, SOC1 and FT genes were upregulated after vernalization at 2 °C for 2 weeks, whereas gene expression of the control treatment was not detected. This study demonstrates that vernalization treatment could induce off-season flowering in sub-tropical strawberry cv. Pharachatan 80 by activating flowering genes.

Strawberry production in tropical and subtropical climates has been adversely affected by rising temperatures and reduced cooling periods, leading to a decrease in flower induction and overall yield. This experiment aimed to investigate the effects of root zone cooling on short-day strawberry plants cultivated under evaporative greenhouse conditions. The cooling methods employed included of four root zone cooling treatments: normal water dripping (NWD), cold-water (10 °C) dripping (CWD), cold-water dripping plus cold-water pipe (CWD + CWP), and normal water dripping plus cold-water pipe (NWD + CWP) embedded within the growing media. The results indicated that the CWD + CWP treatment was particularly effective, reducing RZT by approximately 2 °C compared to other treatments, thereby promoting both vegetative and reproductive growth, particularly in the ‘Akihime’ strawberry. In the absence of root zone cooling, ‘Akihime’ and ‘Pharachatan 88’ were still capable of producing flowers and yield, whereas ‘Pharachatan 80’ was not. In addition, ‘Pharachatan 80’ was affected by CWD + CWP which showed the highest levels of total phenolic compound, total anthocyanin, and total vitamin C among all treatments. It can be concluded that reducing the root zone temperature through the integrated application of cold-water dripping and embedded cold-water pipes in the growing media can enhance the growth and development of short-day strawberry plants cultivated under evaporative greenhouse conditions in a tropical climate.

Strawberry production in tropical and subtropical climates has been adversely affected by rising temperatures and reduced cooling periods, leading to a decrease in flower induction and overall yield. This experiment aimed to investigate the effects of root zone cooling on short-day strawberry plants cultivated under evaporative greenhouse conditions. The cooling methods employed included of four root zone cooling treatments: normal water dripping (NWD), cold-water (10 °C) dripping (CWD), cold-water dripping plus cold-water pipe (CWD+CWP), and normal water dripping plus cold-water pipe (NWD+CWP) embedded within the growing media. The results indicated that the CWD+CWP treatment being particularly effective, reducing RZT by approximately 2 °C compared to other treatments. Thereby promoting both vegetative and reproductive growth, particularly in the ‘Akihime’ strawberry. In the absence of root zone cooling, ‘Akihime’ and ‘Pharachatan 88’ were still capable of producing flowers and yield, whereas ‘Pharachatan 80’ was no. In addition, ‘Pharachatan 80’ was affected by CWD+CWP which shown highest of total phenolic compound, total anthocyanin and total vitamin C among all treatments. It can be concluded that reducing the root zone temperature through the combined use of cold water dripping embedded cold-water pipe in the growing media can enhance the growth and development of short-day strawberry plants cultivated under evaporative greenhouse conditions in tropical climate.

Seedlessness in table grapes is a desirable trait for consumers. Plant growth regulators (PGRs) have been extensively utilized to induce seedlessness. However, the efficacy of these PGRs is not uniformly successful. In addition, the seedlessness is difficult to detect by cutting and counting technique. The shortwave-near infrared spectroscopy (SW-NIRS), coupled with suitable chemometric analysis, is a non-destructive method for sorting and prediction of seedlessness grapes. The NIRS is higher efficiency than original technique in term of accuracy, measuring time and waste reduction.•The SW-NIR spectra of 240 grape berries were recorded. Each reflectance spectrum was acquired in the wavenumber of 3996-12,489 cm^-1. After that all grape berries were cut and count for seedlessness sorting.All spectral together with seedlessness sorting were be analysis by chemometrics.•The NIR spectral data were analyzed using principal component analysis (PCA). In addition, supervised self-organizing map (SSOM) and quadratic discriminant analysis (QDA) were applied to classify the seedlessness.•The PCA results represented a negative tendency to classify the seedlessness. Clear classification tendency can be obtained from SOMs. Good predictive results from SSOM were obtained, as it gave a percentage correctly classified of 97.14 and 94.64% for training and test sample sets, respectively.

The experiment was carried out during October 2022 to January 2023 at Mae Hea Agricultural Research, Demonstration and Training Center, Faculty of Agriculture, Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai Province, Thailand; latitude: 18° 44′ 36″ North, Longitude: 98° 57′ 50″ East, and an al-titude 304 msl. Evaporative greenhouse, 9.6 x 40 square meters, with 8 planting troughs was prepared, Sensors and Internet of Things (IoT) system were installed to monitor continuously vital parameters, collect data, and send timely alerts to facilitate problem resolution. The data were displayed via IoT platform dashboard. An average air temperature, light intensity, media moisture and CO2 concentration in the greenhouse during 4 months was 21.1 ◦C, 12,948 Lux, 2 kPa and 495 ppm, respectively. The average maximum temperature in the evaporative greenhouse was 29.6 ◦C, which 4.2 ◦C lower than outside; 33.8 ◦C. Root-zone cooling of the strawberry planting was de-signed as factorial 3x4 in completely randomized design (CRD). Factor A was the short-day strawberry cultivars: 1) “Pharachatan 88” 2) “Pharachatan 80” and 3) “Akihime”. Factor B was the root-zone cooling treatments: 1) normal water dripping (NWD) 2) cold water dripping (CWD) 3) cold water dripping + cold water piping (CWD+CWP) and 4) normal water dripping + cold water piping (NWD+CWP). The results revealed that there was an interaction between the two factors on canopy width, leave width, crown diameter, number of flowers, fruit qualities and fruit color, whereas plant height, leaves length, SPAD and number of inflorescences were not affected by the interaction between the two factors. Four months after the experiment, the root-zone cooling treatments had no effect on chlorophyll contents, whereas “Pharachatan 80” had lower chlorophyll content than others. The CWD+CWP treatment could reduce 2 °C of root-zone temperature and leading to promote vegetative and reproductive growth in strawberry plants. Anyhow, without the root-zone cooling treatment, “Akihime”and “Pharachatan 88” still could produce flowers and yield, but “Pharachatan 80” could not. Furthermore, “Akihime” seemed appreciable in flowering, TSS and yield as compared to others.