Mitigation of salt induced stress via arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (Rhizophagus irregularis) inoculation in Cucurbita maxima Duch

Abstract

It has been projected that about 7% of the earth’s agricultural land is exposed to extreme soil salinity levels. High presence of salts in soil reduces plant water content and nutrient uptake thereby disrupting the dissemination of ions at both the cellular and the whole-plant levels, ultimately inducing osmotic and ionic disparities. The current research was carried out to examine the role of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (Rhizophagus irregularis) in alleviating adverse effects of salt stress in Cucurbita maxima. Physicochemical properties of the experimental soils analysis (saline and garden soils) indicated significant (p=0.05) differences between the two soil types in; pH, total nitrogen, available phosphorus, Ex. Ca, Ex. Mg, Ex. K, OC, Ex. Na and EC. Saline soil treatment significantly (p=0.05) reduced photosynthetic pigments contents (chlorophyll a, b and carotenoids), minerals (N, P, K, Mg and Ca), leaf relative water content (LRWC), shoot length, dry weight as well as percentage arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi colonization (45.45 to 20.34%) and mycorrhizal dependency (100.00% to 13.87%).