Erratum to: Reactive oxygen species mediated improvement in vigour of static and pulsed magneto-primed cherry tomato seeds

Abstract

Seed priming with magnetic field was used to improve germination, vigour and yield in cherry tomato seeds. Cherry tomato seeds were magneto-primed with various doses of static magnetic field (SMF) in the range of 50–150 milliTesla (mT) for duration of 30 min and 1 h. SMF dose of 100 mT for 30 min gave maximum increase in germination characteristics and was selected for application as pulsed dose. Seeds were exposed to pulsed magnetic field (PMF) dose in the cycles of 2, 3, 5 or 6 min on and off where PMF dose of 3 min on and off cycle showed substantial enhancement of 23 % in seedling vigour compared to other treatments. Superoxide ion and hydrogen peroxide contents increased by two fold in static and pulsed magneto-primed seeds. Antioxidant enzymes system revealed increased superoxide dismutase activity and oxidative reaction of peroxidase resulted in production of hydrogen peroxide during germination of magneto-primed seeds. Increased ascorbate peroxidase activity during initial stages and catalase at later stages of germination helped in scavenging of hydrogen peroxide in germinating magneto-primed seeds. PMF treated seeds showed better response in terms of invigoration and reactive oxygen species related parameters than static magneto-primed seeds. Both static and pulsed magneto-primed seeds were evaluated for their field performance. Yield increased by 17 % in SMF and 27 % in plants from PMF primed seeds. There was no major change in the number of fruits and the increase in yield was mainly due to a substantial increase in weight per fruit, which was 7.76 and 8.55 g in SMF and PMF, respectively as compared to 6.4 g in control. Fruit quality was also better in primed compared to control seeds. Our results indicated that pulsed magneto-priming is more effective in dry seed priming treatment for seed invigoration in cherry tomatoes.