Soybean is one of the most important staple legume crops worldwide due to its high protein and oil content as well as its nitrogen fixing ability. Soybean is classified as moderate salt sensitive crop, with salinity causing adverse effects on all developmental stages, including seed germination and post-germinative growth. This study aimed at determining seed germination and seedling growth potential under salt stress conditions as a short-cut approach to identify salt tolerant genotypes at early growth stages. To this direction, nine commercial and pre-commercial varieties, whose adaptation to increased soil salinity is unknown, were imposed to salt stress using solutions differing in NaCl concentration (50, 100, 200mM NaCl), while non-stressed plants served as controls. Evaluation of tolerance was performed on the basis of germination percentage, seed water absorbance, seedling water content, root and shoot length and number of seedlings with abnormal phenotype. Overall findings revealed that stress substantially affects all traits associated to seed germination and seedling growth, with the effects being analogous to the stress level applied, yet genotypes exhibited varying response to increased salinity. Overall data suggest that seed germination and seedling growth potential may be readily employed to reveal genetic variability related to salt tolerance in soybean germplasm. Such screening approach may serve for selecting suitable germplasm material at early growth stages, thus upgrading all relevant breeding procedures
CITATION STYLE
Pavli, O. I. (2021). Effect of Salinity on Seed Germination and Seedling Development of Soybean Genotypes. International Journal of Environmental Sciences & Natural Resources, 27(2). https://doi.org/10.19080/ijesnr.2021.27.556210
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