INDUCTION OF DROUGHT TOLERANCE CAPABILITY OF BARI GOM 30 (Triticum aestivum L.) THROUGH UREA AND HYDRO PRIMING

Abstract

The experiment was conducted under the laboratory condition at the Department of Agronomy, Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University, Dhaka from August 2019 to July 2020 to study the induction of drought tolerance capability in wheat through urea and hydro priming. In the 1 st experiment, wheat seeds of BARI Gom 30 were surface sterilized with 75% alcohol for 5 minutes. The seeds were then pre-soaked in 0%, 2%, 4%, 6%, 8% and 10% urea solution and in distilled water for 9 hours and untreated seeds were used as control treatment. The results showed that seed priming influenced the germination percentage, growth parameters (seedling fresh weight, root length, shoot length, shoot dry weight, root dry weight and vigor index) and water relation behaviours (relative water content, water retention capacity and water saturation deficit) of wheat. The highest germination percentage (98.21%), root and shoot length (162.07 mm and 174.90 mm), seedling fresh weight (275.19 mg), root and shoot dry weight (12.27 mg and 16.59 mg), vigour index (330.93), water retention capacity (18.53%) and relative water content (93.15%) were obtained from the seeds treated with 6% urea solution and these values then gradually decreased with increasing urea concentration. The highest water saturation deficit (19.73%) was obtained from control treatment and lowest (6.85%) obtained from seeds treated with 6% urea solution. In 2 experiment, seeds primed with 6% urea for 9 hours, hydro primed (distilled water for 9 hours) and non-primed seeds were placed under drought stress condition as induced by 0%, 5%, 10%, 15% and 20% PEG solution. Seeds treated with 6% urea solution showed better result compared to hydro primed and control (non-primed) seeds with up to 10% PEG concentrations in all parameters and this value decreased with further increasing concentrations of PEG solution. Hydro priming also gave better result than non-primed seeds in all parameters but not better than 6% urea priming solutions. So, seeds primed with both 6% urea solution and distilled water had the better performance compared to non-primed seeds under drought stress condition. The result thus suggested that seeds primed with 6% urea solution for 9 hours considered as best priming concentration for inducing drought tolerance in wheat seeds for germination, water relation behaviour and all other related growth parameters.