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Alleviation of Drought Stress in Maize by Exogenous Application of Gibberellic Acid and Cytokinin

Nurunnaher Akter
Department of Agronomy, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Agricultural University, Gazipur-1706, Bangladesh

M. Rafiqul Islam
Department of Agronomy, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Agricultural University, Gazipur-1706, Bangladesh

M. Abdul Karim
Department of Agronomy, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Agricultural University, Gazipur-1706, Bangladesh

Tofazzal Hossain
Department of Crop Botany, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Agricultural University, Gazipur-1706, Bangladesh

Abstract/ Executive Summary:

The study was conducted to investigate the ameliorative roles of GA₃ and CK on adverse effects of drought in maize. Drought stressed maize plants were applied with GA₃ and CK at 50, 100, and 150 mg L^-1as foliar spray at the vegetative and the reproductive stages. Plant height, internode length, stem diameter, leaf chlorophyll index, and dry matter production were significantly affected by drought. In most cases, GA₃an CK significantly improved the depressed plant traits, but in varying degrees depending on the growth stage encountering hormones, and their types and concentrations. Both GA₃ and CK were found to be very effective in alleviating drought-imposed adverse effects on maize at the vegetative phase. Such alleviating effects varied depending on the concentration of the hormones. Application of CK at 150 mg L^-1l was excellent resulting in a 106% yield advantage compared to drought stress and 79.9% increase relative to well-watered controls. Conversely, GA₃ at 50 mg L^-1 performed well showing 78.8% increase in grain yield. However, both GA₃ and CK had very little effect on improving the depressed growth and yield attributes in maize at the reproductive phase. The relative yield advantages for the hormones were mainly attributed to improving the cob and seed-bearing capacity of drought-stressed maize plants.

Keywords: Cytokinin (CK), Drought alleviation, Gibberellic acid (GA3),Growth and yield, Maize

Location: Stress Research Site of the Department of Agronomy, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Agricultural University, Gazipur-1706

Start Date: 00-12-2009

End Date: 00-05-2010

Program Area: Crop-Soil-Water Management

Commodity: Maize

Objectives:

To investigate the ameliorative roles of GA₃ and CK on adverse effects of drought in maize

Methodology:

Experimental site and plant materials: The experiment was conducted under semi-controlled environmental conditions in the Stress Research Site of the Department of Agronomy, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Agricultural University, Gazipur-1706, Bangladesh during the period from December 2009 to May 2010. The location lies 24.09° N latitude and 90.26° E longitude. A widely used variety BARI maize-5 developed by Bangladesh Agricultural Research Institute (BARI) was used in the experiment. Plant establishment: A total of 192 plants were grown in Waggoner pots having 12 kg sandy clay loam soil. Organic compost was added in pots for maintaining a soil compost ratio of 4 : 1. Chemical fertilizers, i.e. urea, triple super phosphate, muriate of potash and gypsum were applied as per recommendation. Two sets of pots of which one containing 96 plants were kept for vegetative stage treatment and another set containing 96 plants were retained for reproductive stage treatment. Soil moisture was maintained at full capacity up to the imposition of drought treatments. Imposition of drought and hormonal treatments: In the experiment, the well-watered pots designated as control were maintained at full pot capacity. Drought treatment was maintained by keeping soil moisture at 25% pot capacity by regular monitoring. Drought stress (DS) treatment was imposed at the vegetative (45 - 69 DAE) and the reproductive (70 - 94 DAE) stages. The hormonal treatments GA₃ and CK at 50, 100, and 150 mg L^-1 were applied to drought-stressed plants two times at 11-day intervals, i.e. at 49 and 60 DAE at the vegetative stage and at 74 and 85 DAE at the reproductive stage. Different concentrations of GA₃and CK were prepared and applied as a foliar spray. Drought stressed and hormone-treated plants were given optimum moisture at 69 DAE onwards for the vegetative stage treatment and at 94 DAE onwards for the reproductive stage treatment. Half of the plants were harvested at the end of both drought and hormonal treatments at every growth stage. The remaining plants were allowed to grow until final harvest at 123 DAE. At the same time, a separate set of plants were kept under drought conditions at both the growth stages without imposing a hormonal treatment for comparison.Measurement of plant traits and grain yield: Data were recorded on plant height, internode length, stem diameter, cob length, cob diameter, number of cobs per plant, number of seeds per cob, 100-grain weight, leaf chlorophyll index (SPAD values), leaf area, plant components dry weight, yield attributes, and grain yield. Experimental design and Statistical analysis: The experiment was laid out in a randomized complete block design with six replications. Analysis of variance was conducted using MSTAT-C software and significance of differences among means was compared employing DMRT. Necessary correlations were determined with the program SPSS version 16.

Source of Information: J. Crop Sci. Biotech.17 (1) : 41-48, 2014

Article Link (Online Journal):

Funding Source:

1. Government

Budget:

Total Budget (Tk.) :

Achievement/Findings:

The combined results of the experiment indicated that using GA₃ and CK in drought-stressed plants at the vegetative growth stage improved the growth attributes and produced stable yield as compared to without using these elements. The vegetative stage was the appropriate growth stage at which exogenously applied GA₃ and CK effectively alleviated the adverse effects of drought in maize. In point of fact, low concentration of GA₃ and high concentration of CK improved drought tolerance of maize plants by maintaining higher biomass production and its greater contribution to grain size and grain yield.

Knowledge Management: Journal