Abstract
Under salt stress conditions, plant growth is reduced due to osmotic, nutritional and oxidative imbalance. However, salicylic acid acts in the mitigation of this abiotic stress by promoting an increase in growth, photosynthesis, nitrogen metabolism, synthesis of osmoregulators and antioxidant enzymes. In this context, the objective was to evaluate the effect of salicylic acid doses on the growth and physiological changes of eggplant seedlings under salt stress. The experiment was conducted in a greenhouse, where the treatments were distributed in randomized blocks using a central composite matrix Box with five levels of electrical conductivity of irrigation water (CEw) (0.50; 1.08; 2.50; 3.92 and 4.50 dS m-1), associated with five doses of salicylic acid (SA) (0.00; 0.22; 0.75; 1.28 and 1.50 mM), with four repetitions and each plot composed of three plants. At 40 days after sowing, plant height, stem diameter, number of leaves, leaf area, electrolyte leakage, relative water content, and total dry mass were determined. ECw and SA application influenced the growth and physiological changes of eggplant seedlings. Increasing the ECw reduced growth in the absence of SA. Membrane damage with the use of SA remained stable up to 3.9 dS m-1 of ECw. The relative water content independent of the CEw increased with 1.0 mM of SA. The use of SA at the concentration of 1.0 mM mitigated the deleterious effect of salinity on seedling growth up to 2.50 dS m-1 of ECw.
Highlights
There was a significant interaction for all variables analyzed, except the stem diameter, demonstrating that both factors, electrical conductivity of irrigation water (ECw) and application of salicylic acid (SA) interfere simultaneously in the growth of eggplant seedlings
Salicylic acid acts in the morphophysiological regulation of eggplant under salt stress conditions (Raghami et al, 2016)
The excess of salts without application of SA, as well as a high concentration of the acid associated with the highest saline levels, promoted a harmful effect on the growth of seedlings, since the continuous addition of water with high levels of soluble and toxic salts can cause water deficit, nutritional imbalance and toxicity by specific ions, interfering in the plant’s growth (Parihar et al, 2015; Taiz et al, 2017)
Summary
There was a significant interaction for all variables analyzed, except the stem diameter, demonstrating that both factors, electrical conductivity of irrigation water (ECw) and application of SA interfere simultaneously in the growth of eggplant seedlings. The seedlings irrigated with water of 2.5 dS m-1 showed a quadratic effect with an increase to a concentration of 1.2 mM of acid, they showed 8.56 cm and successive height reduction (Figure 1).
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