Vol. 11, Issue 4 (2022)

Author(s):
Rifat M Bhat, Farooq A Khan, Imtiyaz Murtaza, Gulzaffar, Moinuddin and Mohammad Amir

Abstract:
A study was performed at SKUAST-Kashmir to understand the mechanisms of seed deterioration under AA and its reversal through subsequent OP. The seeds were exposed to AA treatment for 0, 48, 72 and 96 hours at 45±2 °C and 100% R.H. Each lot of treated seeds was further divided into four sub-lots and osmo-primed with PEG 6000 for 0, 24, 48 and 72 hours at 25±2 °C. Fifty seeds from each sub-lot were placed in petri dishes and placed in an incubator at 25 °C for recording various germination parameters. AA significantly reduced the GP and CVG from 85.56 and 43.78 (A0) to 12.66 and 9.00 (A3). There were significant reduction in shoot and root length (5.94 → 2.93cm; 4.83 → 2.99cm), seedling biomass (21.18 → 15.84md), SVIs (18.12 → 2.01; 921.5 → 75.0) in A3 compared to A0. However, these attributes were found to increase to maximum of 59.84%, 29.38, 5.38cm, 4.45cm, 19.69mg, 11.71 and 5.80 due to different OP treatments. In line, biochemical attributes like shoot chlorophyll, sugar, protein, MSI and anti-oxidant potential were also found to deprive due to AA effects and build up after OP treatments.