Effect of seed soaking with Brassinolide on the vitality and vigor of Sorghum seed cultivars

Abstract

A laboratory experiment was conducted at the Seed Technology Laboratory of the Department of Field Crops - College of Agriculture - the University of Anbar with the goal of To study the effect of seed soaking with the growth regulator brassinolide on the viability and vigor of seeds of cultivars sorghum, using a Complete Random Design (CRD). The first factor was soaking the seeds with the growth regulator brassinolide at concentrations of (200, 400, and 600) mg L-1 in addition to the control treatment (soaking with distilled water only) for the laboratory experiment with four repetitions. The second factor was three maize varieties White (Inqath, Rabah, and Lilo). The experiment results revealed that the stimulus treatment with brassinolide growth regulator at a concentration of 600 mg L-1 was significantly superior, with the highest averages for most of the studied traits, including germination speed (73.33 percent), standard laboratory germination rate (94.43 %), root length (16.08 cm), and feather length (15.36 cm). Besides, seedling strength (2968.2) and dry weight (0.0545 mg) in comparison to the control treatment (soaking in distilled water only), which had the lowest averages for the parameters evaluated. In terms of cultivars, the cultivar outperformed the rest of the cultivars in most of the measured attributes, with the highest standards. The cultivar was a Rabah in terms of germination speed (67.72 percent), germination percentage (87.67 %), stalk length (13.21 cm), gesture strength (2371.1), and dry weight (0.0513). Mg). The Inqath cultivar excelled in root length, recording the greatest average of (13.90 cm). The results revealed a significant effect of the interaction between the study parameters in most of the analyzed qualities. Based on the findings of this study. It can be concluded that stimulating the seeds with the growth regulator brassinolide generally resulted in an increase and improvement of all evaluated features, which reflected positively on seed viability and vigor. Keywords: Sorghum bicolor, growth regulator, seedling viability.