aDepartment of Botany, Bareilly College, Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh, India
bDepartment of Chemistry, Bareilly College, Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh, India
1Corresponding author
Online published on 31 January, 2014.
Besides many important morphological and physiological facets, an important consequence of abiotic stresses is an increase of reactive oxygen species (H2 O2) in the cells thereby causing adverse effects upon many metabolic functions. To investigate the effect of H2 O2 on some important metabolic activities, an experiment was designed under salinized medium (4mScm−1 NaCl) pre-treating the alfalfa seeds in 1,50 and 100 mM H2 O2 solution for eight hours. The penetration of H2 O2 in fresh seeds was observed to reduce at all concentrations attaining maximum at 5 hrs. It declined gradually up to water control at 6, 7 and 8 hrs. H2 O2 treatment brought about an improvement in shoot fresh and dry weight, leaf osmotic potential and crude proteins while mean germination time (MGT) was observed to curtail. It may be suggested that H2 O2 signaling activates the antioxidants vis-à-vis scavenging of hydrogen in seeds of alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.)
Hydrogen Peroxide, Alfalfa, Salinity
