Effects of Biochar Amendment and Nitrogen Fertilizer on RVA Profile and Rice Grain Quality Attributes.

Izhar Ali,Quan Zhao,Ihsan Muhammad,Ligeng Jiang,Hua Zhang,Saif Ullah,He Liang,Minghua Gu,Mei Yang,Min Huang,Pengli Yuan,Anas Iqbal

doi:10.3390/foods11050625

Izhar Ali, Quan Zhao + Show 10 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/foods11050625

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Abstract

Improving rice production in modern agriculture relies heavily on the overuse of chemical fertilizer, which adversely affects grain quality. Biochar (BC) application is well known for enhancing rice yield under reduced nitrogen (N) application. Therefore, we conducted a two-year field experiment in 2019 and 2020 to evaluate RVA profile characteristics, grain milling, and appearance qualities under four BC rates (0, 10, 20, 30 t ha−1) in combination with two N levels (135 and 180 kg ha−1). The results showed that BC at 30 t ha−1 along with 135 kg N ha−1 improved rapid visco-analyzer (RVA) profile attributes, including peak viscosity (4081.3), trough viscosity (3168.0), break down (913.3), final viscosity (5135.7), and set back (1967.7). Grain yield, grain rain length, milled rice rate, percent grains with chalkiness, amylose, and starch content were improved by 27%, 23%, 37%, 24%, 14%, and 8%, respectively, in the plots treated with the combination of 30 t BC ha−1 and 180 kg N ha−1. A positive coefficient of correlation was observed in RVA profile, milling, and apparent quality of rice with soil properties. These results suggested that BC at 20 to 30 t ha−1 in combination with 135 kg N ha−1 is a promising option for enhancing grain yield, RVA profile, appearance, and milling quality.

Highlights

Rice crop production and quality enhancement are a great challenge to overcoming the rising global population’s need [1]
The results showed that BC in combination with N fertilizer more notably improved pH, available potassium (AK), available phosphorus (AP), total nitrogen (TN), soil organic carbon (SOC), and bulk density (BD) than did solely N treatments
Rice grain quality is adversely affected by the overuse of chemical fertilizers, which is currently used for improving grain yield in modern agriculture [21]

Summary

Introduction

Rice crop production and quality enhancement are a great challenge to overcoming the rising global population’s need [1]. The overuse of inorganic fertilizer has significantly reduced soil health, which is a major concern for agricultural output and grain quality. Farmers believe that using higher doses of chemical fertilizers is the easy, dependable way to increase crop production [7] while ignoring the awful impacts on soil, crop quality, and environment [8]. To cope with these problems, alternatively, BC amendment is well known for improving soil physiochemical properties [9] and crop physiology without increasing chemical fertilizer usage [3,10]

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