Correlation between dynamic tomato fruit-set and source–sink ratio: a common relationship for different plant densities and seasons?

Abstract

Most sink parameters were stable over multiple planting densities and seasons. From planting, source-sink ratio increased in the vegetative stage and reached a peak after fruit-set commenced, followed by a decrease of leaf appearance rate. Fruit-set probability was correlated with the source-sink ratio after the appearance of flower buds. The relationship between fruit-set probability and the most correlated source-sink ratio could be quantified by a single regression line for both experiments. The current work paves the way to predicting dynamic fruit-set using a functional structure model.