Mitigation of Salinity-Induced Oxidative Damage, Growth, and Yield Reduction in Fine Rice by Sugarcane Press Mud Application

Imran Khan; Awon Muhammad; Muhammad Umer Chattha; Milan Skalicky; Muhammad Bilal Chattha; Muhammad Ahsin Ayub; Muhammad Rizwan Anwar; Walid Soufan; Muhammad Umair Hassan; Md Atikur Rahman; Marian Brestic; Marek Zivcak; Ayman El Sabagh

doi:10.3389/fpls.2022.840900

Mitigation of Salinity-Induced Oxidative Damage, Growth, and Yield Reduction in Fine Rice by Sugarcane Press Mud Application

Front Plant Sci. 2022 Apr 26:13:840900. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2022.840900. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Agronomy, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad, Pakistan.
² Department of Botany and Plant Physiology, Faculty of Agrobiology, Food, and Natural Resources, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, Prague, Czechia.
³ Department of Agronomy, Faculty of Agricultural Sciences, University of the Punjab, Lahore, Pakistan.
⁴ Rice Research Station, Bahawalnagar, Pakistan.
⁵ Plant Production Department, College of Food and Agriculture Sciences, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
⁶ Research Center on Ecological Sciences, Jiangxi Agricultural University, Nanchang, China.
⁷ Grassland and Forage Division, National Institute of Animal Science, Rural Development Administration, Cheonan-si, South Korea.
⁸ Laboratory Slovak University of Agriculture in Nitradisabled, Nitra, Slovakia.
⁹ Institut of Plant and Environmental Sciences, Faculty of Agrobiology and Food Resources, Slovak University of Agriculture, Nitra, Slovakia.
¹⁰ Department of Agronomy, Faculty of Agriculture, Kafrelsheikh University, Kafrelsheikh, Egypt.

Abstract

Salinity stress is one of the major global problems that negatively affect crop growth and productivity. Therefore, ecofriendly and sustainable strategies for mitigating salinity stress in agricultural production and global food security are highly demandable. Sugarcane press mud (PM) is an excellent source of the organic amendment, and the role of PM in mitigating salinity stress is not well understood. Therefore, this study was aimed to investigate how the PM mitigates salinity stress through the regulation of rice growth, yield, physiological properties, and antioxidant enzyme activities in fine rice grown under different salinity stress conditions. In this study, different levels of salinity (6 and 12 dS m^-1) with or without different levels of 3, 6, and 9% of SPM, respectively were tested. Salinity stress significantly increased malondialdehyde (MDA, 38%), hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂, 74.39%), Na⁺ (61.5%), electrolyte leakage (40.32%), decreased chlorophyll content (32.64%), leaf water content (107.77%), total soluble protein (TSP, 72.28%), and free amino acids (FAA, 75.27%). However, these negative effects of salinity stress were reversed mainly in rice plants after PM application. PM application (9%) remained the most effective and significantly increased growth, yield, TSP, FAA, accumulation of soluble sugars, proline, K⁺, and activity of antioxidant enzymes, namely, ascorbate peroxidase (APX), catalase (CAT), and peroxidase (POD). Thus, these findings suggest a PM-mediated eco-friendly strategy for salinity alleviation in agricultural soil could be useful for plant growth and productivity in saline soils.

Keywords: anti-oxidants; ionic balance; photosynthetic pigments; press mud; rice; salt stress.