Medicinal Plants
S. A. H. Bahari Meymandi; Sh. Sharafzadeh; O. Alizadeh; F. Bazrafshan; B. Amiri
Abstract
Introduction In recent years, the aggressive application of chemical fertilizers for agricultural production has endangered the health of soil, water, air, as well as crops, and has raised many concerns for the global environment and human health. In addition to the positive biological effects and ...
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Introduction In recent years, the aggressive application of chemical fertilizers for agricultural production has endangered the health of soil, water, air, as well as crops, and has raised many concerns for the global environment and human health. In addition to the positive biological effects and modification of soil physical and chemical properties due to the gradual release of nutrients, organic fertilizers cause less pollution in the environment. Due to the significant role of medicinal and aromatic plants in different industries, it is important to increasing production of yield and secondary metabolite produced without the use of harmful chemical fertilizers. Fennel (Foeniculum vulgare Mill) is widely grown in arid and semi-arid regions and due to its economic importance and pharmaceutical industrial applications, it is one of the world’s most dimension medicinal plant. This plant has antiseptic, antispasmodic, antiinflammatory, diuretic, carminative and analgesic effects and is effective in gastrointestinal disorder treatment. Moreover with its antioxidant and antiulcer properties, it is used to treat neurological disorders.Materials and Methods This study was conducted to evaluate the effects of organic and biological fertilizers on the morpho-physiological and phytochemical properties of fennel (Foeniculum vulgar Miller). In this study, the impacts of vermicompost (0, 4, 8% in pot), animal manure (0, 7.5, 15% in pot) and mycorrhizal fungi (0, 1%) on physiological and biochemical properties of fennel in greenhouse conditions was evaluated. In order to extract the samples to measure biochemical factors, methanol 70% was used at a ratio of 5:1 (volume- weight). Determination of free radical scavenging was performed by using the DPPH test. The samples’ absorptions were read at a wavelength of 517 nm with Epoch Microplate Spectrophotometer, BioTek Instruments, Inc., USA. Measuring the total phenols was performed according to the Folin’s reagent method and the use of gallic acid as standard (purchased from the brand MERCK, Germany) by using a spectrophotometer at the wavelength of 765 nm. Total flavonoid content was measured using a spectrophotometer at a wavelength of 510 nm through a standard curve of quercetin from Sigma-Aldrich. The Essential oils were obtained from seeds by hydrodistillation for 3 h using a clevenger type device. The analyses of essential oil volatile components were determined by gas chromatography (GC) and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). Data were analyzed by using Duncan’s multiple range test (P< 0.05) by SAS, version 9.4 for Windows.Results and Discussion The results of current investigation showed that organic and biological fertilizers improved the fennel yield and phytochemical properties such as the plant height, seed weight per plant, fresh and dry weight of roots and plants, content of total phenols and flavonoids, antioxidant activity, percentage of essential oil and root colonization. The highest plant height, number of flowers, umbrellas and seeds per plant and fresh and dry weight of roots were obtained after combined application of 8% in pot vermicompost, 15% in pot animal manure and application of mycorrhiza. According to the results, the highest amount of total flavonoids (177.66 mg/100g DW) and root colonization (35.8%) after of 8% in pot vermicompost + 15% in pot animal manure + mycorrhiza application was observed. The results also revealed that the highest fresh and dry weight of the plants (121.33 and 17.41 g, respectively) was obtained after application of mycorrhiza + 15% in pot animal manure. Application of mycorrhiza in combination with 15% in pot animal manure compared to other treatments caused a significant increase in total phenol content in aerial parts with 73.22 mg/100g DW. In addition, the highest amount of antioxidant activity (51%) was obtained after 8% in pot vermicompost + 15% in pot animal manure application. Application of organic and biological fertilizers significantly increased the 1000 seed weight and the percentage of essential oil in fennel. After 15% in pot animal manure treatment, the highest percentage of essential oil by 3.43% was recorded. In general, the highest percentages of essential oil components were related to (E)-Anethole (78.26%), Fenchone (7.15%), Limonene (6.12%) and Methyl chavicol (3.85%), respectively. The amount of (E)-Anethole as the essential oil predominant compound, in the control treatment was 66.92%. The application of mycorrhiza + 4% in pot vermicompost increased the content of (E) -Anethole in essential oil to 80.72%.Conclusion In general, application of vermicompost, animal manure and mycorrhizal fungi improved the growth, biochemical and yield characteristics and essential oil yield of fennel in greenhouse conditions. These fertilizers increased plant yield by providing large amounts of required nutrients and affecting various aspects of root growth and development. Among them, the role of nitrogen may be more prominent due to its participation in protein synthesis and the role of iron in nitrogen fixation, photosynthesis and electron transfer.
Masud Fattahi; Abdorahman Mohammadkhani
Abstract
Introduction: Abiotic stresses, in particular drought, not only compromise crop quality and limit yield, but also restrict the geographical range over which crop production is viable. Plant species have evolved a number of physiological and molecular means to cope with adverse environmental conditions. ...
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Introduction: Abiotic stresses, in particular drought, not only compromise crop quality and limit yield, but also restrict the geographical range over which crop production is viable. Plant species have evolved a number of physiological and molecular means to cope with adverse environmental conditions. Grapevine is a perennial crop grown in various areas around the world. It is highly responsive to local environmental conditions and viticultural practices. Abiotic stresses cause extensive losses to agricultural productivity. Grapevine is no exception to the rule and faces several abiotic stresses throughout its lifespan. Drought, salinity, or heavy metals are serious problems in many parts of the world. The potential of AMF to enhance plant tolerance to abiotic stress conditions has long been known, and their use in sustainable agricultural systems will be of tremendous importance for soil quality and crop productivity under severe edapho-climatic conditions. Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF), a kind of beneficial soil microorganism, can create a symbiotic association with plant roots forming arbuscular mycorrhizas (AMs), which play a role in the regulation of plant growth. This research was carried out in order to determine the effect of deficit irrigation on morphological characteristics of grapevine ʽAsgariʼ cultivar in greenhouse conditions in 2016.
Materials and Methods: The layout was as a factorial experiment in a completely randomized design with three replication and two factors, including Arbuscular mycorrhizal and irrigation regimes. Irrigation treatments were irrigation with 100% moisture content of field capacity (control), 70% moisture content between field capacity and permanent wilting point (MAD 30) and 40% moisture content between field capacity and permanent wilting point (MAD 60) and mycorrhizal treatments was including non-use of mycorrhizal and use of Glomus mosseae, G. intraradices, G. etunicatum and G. verciform. Some morphological traits including height, root length, root volume and root density, fresh and dry weight of leaf, stem and root, leaf area, number of leaf damage, leaf area, leaf diameter and symbiosis percent of grape roots with fungi were measured.
Results and Discussion: The results showed that mycorrhizal and 100% irrigation treatments increased the fresh and dry weight of leaf, stem and root, leaf area and the percentage of mycorrhizal symbiosis. Due to irrigation, the indices measured in the experiment such as height, fresh and dry weight of root, leaf and stem decreased, so that the decrease in without mycorrhizal plants was more than the with mycorrhizal plants. Generally, the use of mycorrhiza in this research has reduced the damaging effects of water stress on the morphological characteristics of grapevine, which in between the G. verciform and G. etunicatum were better than the G. mosseae and G. intraradices.
Conclusion: Grapevine phosphorus deficiency is usually rarely observed, not only mainly because of limited phosphorus requirement, but also because of sufficient phosphorus richness in the majority of vineyard soils and remobilization from bark, wood, and roots during periods of high P demand. Nevertheless, P deficiency have been described in vineyards in Australia, France, Germany and USA. Phosphorus deficiency symptoms correspond to stunt shoot growth, decrease in dry matter, and berry clusters.
Mycorrhizal treatments helped in alleviation of drought stresses. Enhanced uptake and storage of P, beyond what is required for immediate vegetative growth may be of particular importance for heavily pruned crops like grapes, since most of the new shoot growth is removed every year. These results were achieved in the greenhouse under almost controlled conditions and can be difficult to suggest for applying in the field conditions. Such experiments may be organized in the field conditions.
Present-day vineyard practices place several constraints on the use of functions provided by mycorrhiza. The risk of large, costly, or irreversible changes is to be reduced or averted. Future (modern) agriculture should be based on the implementation of ecological management practices that deliberately maintain resilience of ecosystem services. This means integrating the development of vineyard management strategies that optimize the impact of beneficial microbes like mycorrhizal fungi on production. Furthermore, AMF vary in their ability to provide ecological services so that suitable tools have to be defined to fully assess their contribution. Molecular tools have considerably improved the possibility to identify and monitor mycorrhizal fungi in ecosystems, but a quick and reliable test for assessing their functionality is still lacking. For producers’ expectations to be met, a novel industry encompassing soil/mycorrhiza analyses and advice to producers/managers is needed. Additional barriers to rationally exploiting beneficial soil microbes like mycorrhizal fungi as ecosystem services range from economical, technical, and cultural aspects to legislative questions. In spite of this, considerable progress has been made in the last decade for crop plants in general, but also for grapevine, towards the use of AMF.
Bahareh Parsamotlagh; Parviz Rezvani Moghaddam; Reza Ghorbani; Zabihollah Azami Sardooei
Abstract
Introduction: Roselle (Hibiscus sabdarjffaL.) is an annual or biennial plant cultivated in arid and semiarid regions. This plant is grown in parts of Africa, Asia, America and Australia. This plant is ecologically short day, self-pollinated and sensitive to cold and freezing stress. Studies conducted ...
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Introduction: Roselle (Hibiscus sabdarjffaL.) is an annual or biennial plant cultivated in arid and semiarid regions. This plant is grown in parts of Africa, Asia, America and Australia. This plant is ecologically short day, self-pollinated and sensitive to cold and freezing stress. Studies conducted on the medicinal plants in natural ecosystems suggested that using sustainable agriculture system provides the best conditions for the production of these plants, leading to maximum qualitative and quantitative yield in such conditions. In order to analyze the growth indices, leaf area index (LAI) and total dry matter (TDM) is required. Other indices were calculated from LAI and TDM. Considering the importance ofuses andresistant to droughtstress of roselle, this plant cultivate in provinces of Kerman and Fars recently. In order to evaluate the effect of organic, chemical and biological fertilizers on thermal requirements, developmental stages and some of physiological indices of roselle by irrigation levels, was conducted in Jiroft area.
Materials and Methods: In orderto evaluate the effect of organic, chemical and biological fertilizers on thermal requirements, developmental stages and some of physiological indices of roselle by irrigation levels, an experiment was conducted at Agricultural Research Farm Jiroft of Universityin2013-2014 growing season. Theexperiment was conducted as strip plot based on a randomized complete blocks design with three replications. Three irrigation regimes (100%, 80% and 60% of crop waterrequirement) were assigned ashorizontal factor and four fertilizer resources (mycorrhiza, vermicompost, cow manure and chemical fertilizer (NPK)) were allocated as vertical factor. Plant water requirement was calculated by using salinity parameters (sensitivity coefficient, salinity threshold and gradient of yield reduction), plant characteristics (height and the maximum depth of root), vegetation coefficients (first, middle and end of growth season), characteristics and duration of growth period with AGWAT software. Then, treatments of 80% and 60% of plant water requirements were determined and irrigation water per irrigation period was recorded by the water meter. As drip irrigation system with 0.001 Sq. M. were independently used for each treatment.Traits such as LAI, TDM, LAD, CGR and RGR indices and dry sepal yield were measured. All data were subjected to analysis of variance (ANOVA) using SAS 9.3 software. When F test indicated statistical significance at P< 0.01 or P < 0.05, the least significant difference (LSD) was used to separate the means.Figure drawing was done with Excel andSigmaplot Ver. 12.5
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Results and Discussion: The results indicated that roselle is short-day plant and its flowering is stimulated by nearing the short days. Fertilizer resources and irrigation water levels had not significant effect on flowering of plant. Also fertilizer resources and irrigation water levels had significant effect on LAI and TDM. The highest LAD value was found in the cow manure and vermicompost treatments. The highest CGR value was obtained from 100%, 80% and 60% respectively. Growth reduction between irrigation levels 100% and 80% was not significant. Slope decline between irrigation levels (i.e., 100% and 80%) was similar. Slope decline in control and mycorrhizal morethan vermicompost, cow manure and chemical fertilizer. Similar results also reported by Gendy et al., (2012) and Samiran et al., (2010). The results showed that the interaction of Fertilizer resource and levels irrigations on the sepal yield was significant. Sepal yield at all three levels of irrigation showed increase in the plants treated with cow manure, vermicompost and chemical compared with mycorrhizal and control treatment. The highest sepal yield (1217 kg.ha-1) was obtainedfrom100% crop water requirement cow manure treatment and the lowest sepal yield (493 kg.ha-1) was obtained at 60% crop water requirement control treatments.
Conclusion: It seems that among the different fertilizer resources, cow manure and vermicompost have a greater impact on soil water holding compared to other sources of fertilizers (mycorrhiza and chemical fertilizer) by increasing soil organic matter. The results of Growth indices analysis, growth degree days and phenology assessment indicated that the most leaf area index and dry matter was observed at flowering stage and the beginning of flowering rosellewas under the influence of photoperiod. Due to soil and climatic conditions of the study area, using cow manure or vermicompost with 80% of the irrigation water requirement, roselle plant seems appropriate.
Khosro Parvizi; Farshad Dashti
Abstract
To evaluate the influence of arbuscular mycorrhizal inoculation on growth, yield and minituber production of potato plantlets, a pot experiment was conducted using a factorial based on completely randomized design with four replications. The factors were mycorrizal inoculation (non-inoculated and inoculated ...
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To evaluate the influence of arbuscular mycorrhizal inoculation on growth, yield and minituber production of potato plantlets, a pot experiment was conducted using a factorial based on completely randomized design with four replications. The factors were mycorrizal inoculation (non-inoculated and inoculated with Glomus mosseae, Glomus etunicatum and mixed of them) and two potato cultivars (Agria and Sante). Some growing characteristics and physiological traits such as chlorophyll content, internode length stem diameter, stolon length, leaf area, fresh and dry stem weight, fresh and dry root weight and percentage of colonization were measured. After harvesting, minitubers were separated to different classes according their size and their percentage of dry matter was measured. The results showed that inoculation with mycorrhiza had significant effect on all parameters. In growth characters the interaction of cultivar and mycorrhiza was significant only in stolon diameter and root fresh and dry weigh. The interaction of cultivar and mycorrhiza had significant effect on production of all minituber classes. Highest number of minituber was achieved by inoculating with mixture of fungi. Correlation coefficients demonstrated that most of growth parameters and minituber yield had significant relation with colonization percentage.
