Abstract
BackgroundEnvironmental stress is a crucial factor restricting plant growth as well as crop productivity, thus influencing the agricultural sustainability. Biochar addition is proposed as an effective management to improve crop performance. However, there were few studies focused on the effect of biochar addition on crop growth and productivity under interactive effect of abiotic stress (e.g., drought and salinity). This study was conducted with a pot experiment to investigate the interaction effects of drought and salinity stress on soybean yield, leaf gaseous exchange and water use efficiency (WUE) under biochar addition.ResultsDrought and salinity stress significantly depressed soybean phenology (e.g. flowering time) and all the leaf gas exchange parameters, but had inconsistent effects on soybean root growth and WUE at leaf and yield levels. Salinity stress significantly decreased photosynthetic rate, stomatal conductance, intercellular CO2 concentration and transpiration rate by 20.7, 26.3, 10.5 and 27.2%, respectively. Lower biomass production and grain yield were probably due to the restrained photosynthesis under drought and salinity stress. Biochar addition significantly enhanced soybean grain yield by 3.1–14.8%. Drought stress and biochar addition significantly increased WUE-yield by 27.5 and 15.6%, respectively, while salinity stress significantly decreased WUE-yield by 24.2%. Drought and salinity stress showed some negative interactions on soybean productivity and leaf gaseous exchange. But biochar addition alleviate the negative effects on soybean productivity and water use efficiency under drought and salinity stress.ConclusionsThe results of the present study indicated that drought and salinity stress could significantly depress soybean growth and productivity. There exist interactive effects of drought and salinity stress on soybean productivity and water use efficiency, while we could employ biochar to alleviate the negative effects. We should consider the interactive effects of different abiotic restriction factors on crop growth thus for sustainable agriculture in the future.
Highlights
Environmental stress is a crucial factor restricting plant growth as well as crop productivity, influencing the agricultural sustainability
Soybean phenology and leaf gas exchange parameters Soybean phenology and all leaf gas exchange parameters were significantly affected by drought and salinity stress, while no significant effect was observed as consequence of biochar addition, except for photosynthetic rate and stomatal conductance (Table 1)
This study shows that both drought and salinity stress delayed soybean flowering time and depressed leaf gas exchange parameters with negative effect on grain yield
Summary
Environmental stress is a crucial factor restricting plant growth as well as crop productivity, influencing the agricultural sustainability. There were few studies focused on the effect of biochar addition on crop growth and productivity under interactive effect of abiotic stress (e.g., drought and salinity). This study was conducted with a pot experiment to investigate the interaction effects of drought and salinity stress on soybean yield, leaf gaseous exchange and water use efficiency (WUE) under biochar addition. Drought stress could significantly decrease soybean grain yield by 24–50% but gain higher water use efficiency (WUE) [11]. Drought stress could affect plant phenology (e.g., advance or delay flowering time) and influence crop productivity [16]. It has been reported that water shortage at flowering stage negatively affected chickpea (Cicer arietinum Linn.) yield [17], but soybean (Glycine max L.) flowering time was observed no response under drought stress [11]. Plant always has deeper roots being able to assimilate more water and nutrition from deeper soil under drought stress [20]
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