Ripe for a Revisit

I was skimming Scientific American the other day and came across this video regarding ripening fruit with powdered ethylene.
 
You will have to click on the link to view the video since it would not embed on the page, sorry.

Now, as I discussed on one of the original posts for this blog, ethylene is a gas  and a natural plant hormone used for ripening fruit.  I was a bit thrown off by the  video calling it "powdered ethylene" since compressing this gas to a solid would not be a trivial feat without being very cold or under immense pressure. Last week's post discussed that propane must be at -44 °F to even become a liquid, and ethylene is even smaller than that with two carbon atoms and four hydrogen atoms C2H4.

I did a little digging and found that the group traps the ethylene gas in a solid material made from starch.  This porous material allows the ethylene to work its way out of the solid matrix slowly and eventually fill the space surrounding it (like the shipping container with the fruit). Here is a link to the article.

It is still an interesting idea.  The material can be measured easily as a powder and it gives a slow release of ethylene in transit. This way that the food arrives ripe at a grocery store rather than having to be forcibly ripened on site.  I just wish they were a little more clear that it is not solid ethylene.

I don't know if it will catch on, but there is nothing like a ripe Mexican tomato in the depths of Minnesota January.