Effect of Brassinosteroids on Germination and Early Seedling Growth of Groundnut

Groundnut (Arachis hypogaea L.) is an important oilseed crop grown in India. It is utilized as oil and protein crop and it provides large amount of high quality proteins. Man has beenfacing a lot of problem due to nutrient deficiencies. Brassinosteroids are natural plant growth promoting substances which occurs at very low concentration in all plants. The surface sterilized seeds of groundnut were soaked in different concentration of (10⁻⁶ M to 10⁻⁸M) of brassinosteroids. These pretreated seeds were transferred to sterile Petri dish. The treatment significantly increases germination percentage, root length, shoot length, fresh weight and dry weight. Out of the three concentrations 10⁻⁷ M proved best result in groundnut seedling.