Exogenous salicylic acid and ferulic acid improve growth, phenolic and carotenoid content in tomato

Pedro Henrique Gorni,André Apolinário Pereira,Bianca Da Silva Cornelissen

doi:10.36253/ahsc-8295

Abstract

Salicylic acid (SA) and ferulic acid (FA) are considered phenolic compounds that act as elicitors due to their regulatory functions on plant growth, development, metabolic and physiological responses in plants. The aim of this research was to evaluate the effect of SA and FA on growth, fruit quality and synthesis of secondary metabolites in tomato (Solanum lycopersicum cultivar Santa Clara). The experiment was conducted in pots in a greenhouse. The application of SA and FA was performed at concentration of 1.0 mmol L-1 alone and in combination, with water treated plants as control. Exogenous application of SA and FA either alone or in combination (SA + FA) resulted in increases in biomass accumulation and chlorophyll contents in tomato plant; and soluble sugar, total polyphenol, flavonoids, lycopene and β-carotene contents in fruits. It was concluded that application of SA and FA resulted in higher production and concentration of secondary compounds in tomato.

Highlights

Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) belongs to the Solanaceae family and it is considered as lowcalorie food
The results indicated that Salicylic acid (SA) and ferulic acid (FA) both caused a significant increase of growth in tomato (Table 2)
Tomato plants treated with SA and FA presented higher total biomass (Table 2)

Summary

Introduction

Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) belongs to the Solanaceae family and it is considered as lowcalorie food. It is a good source of vitamins A, C and E, and mineral salts (Adalid et al, 2010; Kazemi, 2014). Carotenoids is naturally present in many fruits and vegetables and plays an important role as a functional food when consumed as part of the diet, producing specific health benefits such as reducing the risk of various diseases (MartínezHernández et al, 2016; Mehta et al, 2018) and polyphenols (flavonoids, flavanones and flavones) are present in significant amount in tomato acting as antioxidant, antimutagenic, antiproliferati ve, antiinflammatory and antiatherogenic activities (Martí et al, 2016; Chaudhary et al, 2018). SA plays a significant role in many physiological and biochemical processes of the plant, being able to act as growth regulators and as an abiotic elicitor capable of increasing the synthesis of secondary compounds beneficial to human health (Javanmardi and Akbari, 2016)

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