Secondary Metabolites and Antioxidant Activity of Six Corchorus olitorius L. Accessions Grown Under Water Deficit Stress Condition

Due to climate change, it is expected that in many parts of the world, water deficit (WD) escalates, regularity and length of time with possible detrimental effects on plant growth and development. However, higher plants have developed several mechanisms that help during these extreme environmental conditions and one of the mechanisms is to amass numerous of polyphenolic compounds which are considered to act as protection composites. This study aimed to analyse secondary metabolites and antioxidant activity of six Corchorus olitorius accessions grown under water deficit stress. A greenhouse pot study was conducted during 2022/2023 and 2023/2024 seasons. The six accessions were subjected to 30% FC as water deficit stress and 80% FC as control. In all the measured biochemical variables, their contents increased significantly (P < 0.05) in all the accessions following the water deficit stress treatment. The results demonstrate that the total phenolic content mean value ranged from 83.9-140.5 mg GAE/g during the water deficit stress. Bafia and MSB072 recorded the lowest total flavonoids content mean value of 0.93 and 0.92 mg CEQ/g respectively. The highest tannin content means values of 43.15, 42.83 and 42.11 mg TAE/g were recorded on Local, SUD3 and TOT6684 accessions respectively. Delele1 and TOT6684 was observed to have the highest scavenging capacity. SUD3, TOT6684 and Local had the ability to produce more of the tannins, phenols and flavonoids relative to other accessions during the water deficit stress. Results show that Jew’s mallow accumulates the secondary metabolites as a mechanism to protect against unfavourable environmental conditions.