Mitigation of Salinity Stress on Chickpea Germination by Salicylic Acid Priming
Mustafa Ceritoğlu, Murat Erman
Abstract
Salinity is a global problem that threatens chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) cultivation in all stages from germination to maturity. Also, salt-affected areas in the World are increasing by the day. Germination is one of the primary stages affecting plant growth and seed yield. Thus, germination performance of seeds has a vital role in vegetative and productive stages. Seed priming, a cheap and easily applicable technique, improves the germination performance by regulating enzymatic reactions and controlling water intake. Seed priming is controlled hydration of seeds soaked in a solution that has low osmotic potential to start the germination metabolism without elongation of radical. The aim of the study was to investigate the effects of different priming treatments on germination traits of chickpea under saline conditions. Three levels of salinity (control, 50 mM and 100 mM NaCl) and 5 priming treatments (non-primed, hydro-priming, 0.1 mM, 0.2 mM and 0.3 mM salicylic acid) were used in the study. Germination percentage (GP), mean germination time (MGT), germination rate (GR), germination index (GI) and coefficient of uniformity of germination (CUG) were varied between 80.7-98.3%, 1.40-2.67 day, 38.1-75.7, 37.5-72.5 and 0.3-0.7, respectively. Although all treatments caused significant positive effects, the 0.2 mM SA mostly improved the germination traits in the study. Also, it was determined that 0.2 mM salicylic acid priming is the threshold for chickpea and higher concentrations have inhibitory effects on the germination process.