A NOVEL TREATMENT BY GRAPHENE-BASED NANOMATERIALS AND 6-BENZYLAMINOPURINE TO IMPROVE FLOWERING AND CORM PRODUCTION OF GLADIOLUS GRANDIFLORUS ANDREWS ‘WHITE PROSPERITY’

Abstract

Graphene-based nanomaterials have great potential to improve cut flower production, including the production of high-quality corms of gladiolus locally to compensate for the shortage in imported corms mostly from the Netherlands due to the recent unprecedented global spread of COVID-19. In this study, we investigated the response of the cultivar ‘White Prosperity’ to various doses of nano-carbon as graphene oxide nanomaterials (0, 3, 5 and 7 g/l) in combination with BA (0, 50, 75 and 100 mg/l). The results demonstrated that the combination of the medium or the high BA concentrations (50 and 75 mg/l), with these of nano-carbon (5 and 7 g/l) promoted good vegetative and flowering growth. Pearson’s product correlation showed positive relationships between all the tested parameters except for the number of days to flowering, which negatively correlated with all the traits. These results were further confirmed by PCA results. Our findings provide evidence that nano-carbon can render positive effects on flowering and corm production of gladiolus that may be applicable for other important flower bulb species.

Keywords

• gladiolus grandiflorus
• nano-carbon
• nanotechnology
• flower bulbs
• sword lily