Effects of Priming on Germination and Seedling Growth of Zygophyllum atriplicoides under Drought Stress

Aims The present study aims to shed light on the effects of different treatments of gibberellic, salicylic and ascorbic acid on improving germination parameters of Zygophyllum atriplicoides under in vitro drought stress condition. Materials & Methods The experiment was conducted in a factorial in a completely randomized design. Five levels of drought stress (0, -0.3, -0.6, -0.9, and -1.2Mpa) with and without priming treatments were used in this experiment. The priming treatments included three levels of salicylic acid (100, 200, and 300mg/L), three levels of gibberellic acid (125, 250, and 500ppm), three levels of ascorbic acid (100, 200, and 300mg/L) and simultaneously distilled water were used as control. Each level of treatments had 4 replications and the total number of replications was 200. The studied traits included germination rate, germination percentage, rootlet length, shoot length, seedling length, and seed vigor index. Findings According to the results, priming improved germination rate, germination percentage, rootlet length, shoot length, seedling length, and seed vigor index. Among all priming levels, 250ppm gibberellic acid accounted for the highest effect on germination traits of this species under all drought stress conditions. Conclusion priming with gibberellic acid had significantly more impact on germination parameters under drought stress. Hence, this method serves as a promising step to improve the germination parameters of this plant.