1Institutes of Agriculture Sciences, BHU, Varanasi-221005, Uttar Pradesh, India
Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, C.P. College of Agriculture, S.D. Agricultural University, Sardarkrushinagar-385506, Gujarat, India, E-mail: anujkumarsinghbhu1@gmail.com
Online published on 23 March, 2018.
Osmotic stress effect the germination, vigour, root: shoot ratio and nutrient content at seedling stage. Higher germination percentage was observed in HUL-57 at all the stages of observation at all the treatments i.e of 0 (T1), 5 (T2), 15% (T3) PEG-6000. HUL 57 had higher germination rate, germination energy, mean germination time, than DPL-62 under different treatments. As compared to T1 root dry weight increased under treatment T2 in HUL-57 and decreased under T3 treatment, while in DPL-62 it was the maximum in control and decreased with increased PEG concentrations in the external medium. Seedlings under T1 had the maximum shoot dry weight which decreased progressively with increased PEG concentration in the external medium in both genotypes and DPL-62 had higher shoot dry weight than HUL-57 at all stages and treatments. HUL-57 maintained higher root to shoot weight ratio than DPL-62 with increase in osmotic stress. As compared to T1 root length in genotype HUL-57 increased under treatment T2 while in DPL-62 the maximum root length was observed in control which further decreased with increased PEG-6000 concentration. N, P, K, Mn, Fe, Zn and Cu content in seedlings decreased under osmotic stress. HUL-57 maintained higher amount of these nutrient than DPL-62. It was concluded that HUL-57 maintained higher germination percentage, germination vigour, root length and root: shoot ratio parameters important for drought resistance. HUL-57 also accumulated more N, P, K, Mn, Zn, Fe and Cu contained under osmotic stress.
Osmotic stress, PEG-6000, rootshoot ratio, mineral nutrient contents
