Abstract:
Maize (Zea mays L.) is particularly sensitive to drought stress, resulting in significant yield losses; thus, drought tolerance methods are critical. Melatonin foliar and seed treatment improved plant stress resistance; however, its soil application under controlled and field circumstances was not examined under drought stress and remains unknown. As a result, the current study investigated the effects of different concentrations of Melatonin (0, 100, and 200 µM) on the antioxidant system, photosynthetic pigments, growth, water productivity, yield, and yield-related traits under severe and mild drought stresses (80% and 60% FC) to no drought stress. Two years' findings showed that drought stress resulted in oxidative stress, lower plant pigments and decreased maize growth and morphological features. Melatonin pretreatment with 200 µM increased leaf water traits, including relative water content, plant pigments, proline content, anti-oxidant activities, growth and yield traits, and water productivity. The application of Melatonin with 200 µM considerably reduced water uptake capacity compared to 100 and 0 µM of MEL, whereas both 100 and 200 µM of MEL resulted in reduced water saturation deficit and increased relative water content of maize as compared with no MEL under severe and mild drought stresses. MEL application with 200 µM resulted in greater CAT, POD, APX, and proline activities in maize leaves than in control under mild and severe drought stresses. The physiological traits, including CGR and NAR, grain yield, and water productivity were higher with 200 µM MEL followed by 100 µM as compared with no MEL both under drought and no stress conditions; however, biological yield, harvest index, shelling percentage, thousand-grain weight, grains per ear were also higher both with 100 and 200 µM MEL over control. The lower dose of MEL produced 7 % lesser seed yield from 200 µM based on two year averaged seem economical and can compensate yield reduction and hence recommended for application under drought stress conditions for enhancing maize yield. Overall, these findings imply that Melatonin pre-treatment reduced the inhibitory effects of drought stress on enhancing antioxidant activities, and plant pigment accumulation led to improved growth and yield of maize under mild and severe drought stress conditions.
Page(s):
59-59
DOI:
DOI not available
Published:
Journal: Abstract Book on International Conference on Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security, August 27-31, 2023 , Volume: 0, Issue: 0, Year: 2023
Keywords:
melatonin
,
Soil application
,
growth
,
maize and yield
,
Field experiment