Eggplant has a very limited shelf life and, like other vegetables, is susceptible to different types of damage during and after harvest operations. Besides, according to the inner construction of eggplant fruit, it can be regarded as an inhomogeneous system. It is therefore important to specify how storage might affect their mechanical properties and how they vary in morphology. In this work, eggplants were divided into three portions along the longitudinal axis and their textural properties were separately investigated using different types of test over a 10-day period of storage at ~11˚C and ~90% relative humidity (RH). The results showed that the tension strength, rupture force and Young’s modulus of skin tissue decreased with increasing the length of storage period, and they were generally different in the different portions of the fruit that were sampled as these properties in the upper section were larger than those of the middle and bottom sections. The values of Young’s modulus and rupture force of pulp tissue taken from compression tests decreased from 1.466 to 0.821 MPa and 20.70 to 17.66 N for upper section, 0.637 to 0.536 MPa and 15.33 to 13.13 N for middle section and 0.518 to 0.422 MPa and 14.19 to 12.19 N for bottom section, respectively with the increase in storage period. Similarly, as the samples were stored longer, the Young’s modulus and rupture force of their combined skin and pulp tissues, obtained from penetration tests, decreased from 3.01 to 2.02 MPa and 31.21 to 24.95 N for upper section, 2.59 to 1.66 MPa and 28.64 to 21.66 N for middle section and 1.91 to 1.15 MPa and 23.18 to 17.37 N for bottom section, respectively. It was concluded that the mechanical resistance noticeably decreased towards the bottom third of the fruit.

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