## 3 Results and Discussion
### The Morpho-Textural Characteristic Changes  
There was a significant reduction in the hardness of green peppers, both after cooking and (to a much greater extent) after microwaving. No significant differences were observed in the hardness of yellow peppers after the heat treatment methods used. A significant reduction was observed in the hardness of red peppers due to cooking, as well as (to an even greater extent) a reduction in the hardness of red peppers due to microwaving. The observed changes in bioactive properties were the result of both the application of the appropriate treatment method (cooking or microwave) and depended on the variety of the tested bell pepper. According to a study by [PERSON], the process of cooking green peppers for 10 min results in a significant reduction in the hardness of the processed raw material (707.28 g) relative to the raw material (1137.61 g). \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c c c c} \hline \hline
**R-Stage** & **Processing** & **Hardness** & **Cohesiveness** & **Springiness** & **Chewiness** & **Resilience** \\ \hline \multirow{3}{*}{G} & C & 69.7 \(\pm\) 9.9 b & 0.784 \(\pm\) 0.023 a & 0.667 \(\pm\) 0.000 a & 36.32 \(\pm\) 4.08 b & 0.683 \(\pm\) 0.090 b \\  & B & 18.5 \(\pm\) 2.6 a & 0.583 \(\pm\) 0.037 a & 0.574 \(\pm\) 0.058 a & 6.13 \(\pm\) 0.15 a & 0.660 \(\pm\) 0.047 ab \\  & M & 4.6 \(\pm\) 0.1 a & 0.734 \(\pm\) 0.104 a & 0.588 \(\pm\) 0.078 a & 2.00 \(\pm\) 0.51 a & 0.493 \(\pm\) 0.018 ab \\ \hline \multirow{3}{*}{Y} & C & 12.7 \(\pm\) 7.9 a & 0.884 \(\pm\) 0.036 b & 0.657 \(\pm\) 0.081 a & 6.99 \(\pm\) 3.41 a & 0.889 \(\pm\) 0.148 a \\  & B & 7.5 \(\pm\) 1.2 a & 0.744 \(\pm\) 0.044 a & 1.000 \(\pm\) 0.000 b & 5.62 \(\pm\) 1.19 a & 0.791 \(\pm\) 0.007 a \\  & M & 9.0 \(\pm\) 1.1 a & 0.765 \(\pm\) 0.028 a & 0.810 \(\pm\) 0.033 a & 5.54 \(\pm\) 0.67 a & 0.699 \(\pm\) 0.043 a \\ \hline \multirow{3}{*}{R} & C & 48.6 \(\pm\) 1.1 c & 0.720 \(\pm\) 0.015 a & 0.62 \(\pm\) 0.03 a & 21.73 \(\pm\) 1.10 b & 0.729 \(\pm\) 0.120 a \\  & B & 33.3 \(\pm\) 2.2 b & 0.648 \(\pm\) 0.057 a & 0.70 \(\pm\) 0.05 a & 15.05 \(\pm\) 0.69 b & 0.703 \(\pm\) 0.035 a \\  & M & 17.0 \(\pm\) 3.4 a & 0.718 \(\pm\) 0.032 a & 0.90 \(\pm\) 0.14 a & 11.21 \(\pm\) 4.41 a & 0.819 \(\pm\) 0.017 a \\ \hline \multirow{3}{*}{R-stage} & *** & ** & ** & *** & ns \\  & & *** & ** & *** & ** \\ \cline{1-1}  & R-stage \(\times\) processing & *** & ns & ** & *** & ns \\ \hline \end{tabular}  
* R-stage—ripening stage; G—green pepper; Y—yellow pepper; R—red pepper; C—control; B—boiling; M—microwaving. Lowercase letters means statistically significant difference between samples for same R-stage (\(p=0.05\)); ns—statistically non-significant; *—\(p<0.05\), *—\(p<0.01\), ***—\(p<0.001\).  
\end{table} 
Table 3: Texture parameters of bell peppers of different ripening stages after boiling and microwaving. A similar study indicated that the process of cooking nopal (_Opuntia ficusindica_) fruit for 10 min also causes a significant reduction in hardness (from 506.89 g to 474.50 g), suggesting that cooking this type of vegetable raw material significantly softens the texture [42]. The changes in the external appearance of bell peppers after heat treatment are shown in Figure 1.  
Results obtained by [PERSON] showed that even a 1-minute microwave treatment of raw green peppers significantly reduces the hardness of this raw material (from 1137.61 g to 443.50 g) [42]. It has also been indicated that microwaving nopal (_Opuntia ficusindica_) fruit for 5 min, in turn, significantly increases the hardness (from 506.89 g to 596.17 g) of the processed raw material [42]. It has been indicated that prolonged microwave processing can remove water from the raw material, contributing to its drying and hardening [43].