Improving vitamin content and nutritional value of legume yield through water and hormonal seed priming

Seed priming is one of the methods to improve plant vigour, overcome difficult habitat conditions, and consequently obtain a higher yield. Far less is known about effect of parental seed priming on quality of the seeds produced. The aim of our study was to evaluate the effect of water and hormonal (brassinosteroid) seed priming on the chemical content of the seed yield of pea and lupine, grown in a pot experiment and in the field. Pre-sowing water soaking of parental plant seeds resulted in significant increased protein, lipid, sugar, vitamin E, C and provitamin A content in seeds collected from these plants compared to the content in seeds collected from the control plants (without pre-sowing seed soaking). Priming with brassinosteroid enhanced these effects. The results showed that seed priming may be effectively used as a simple method for improving the quality of legume seeds.