Seed Priming with Brassinosteroids Alleviates Chromium Stress in Rice Cultivars via Improving ROS Metabolism and Antioxidant Defense Response at Biochemical and Molecular Levels
Farwa Basit,
Min Chen,
Temoor Ahmed,
Muhammad Shahid,
Muhammad Noman,
Jiaxin Liu,
Jianyu An,
Abeer Hashem,
Al-Bandari Fahad Al-Arjani,
Abdulaziz A. Alqarawi,
Mashail Fahad S. Alsayed,
Elsayed Fathi Abd_Allah,
Jin Hu,
Yajing Guan
Affiliations
Farwa Basit
Institute of Crop Sciences, College of Agriculture and Biotechnology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China
Min Chen
Institute of Crop Sciences, College of Agriculture and Biotechnology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China
Temoor Ahmed
State Key Laboratory of Rice Biology, Institute of Biotechnology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China
Muhammad Shahid
Department of Bioinformatics and Biotechnology, Government College University, Faisalabad 38000, Pakistan
Muhammad Noman
State Key Laboratory of Rice Biology, Institute of Biotechnology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China
Jiaxin Liu
Institute of Crop Sciences, College of Agriculture and Biotechnology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China
Jianyu An
Institute of Crop Sciences, College of Agriculture and Biotechnology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China
Abeer Hashem
Botany and Microbiology Department, College of Science, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2460, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia
Al-Bandari Fahad Al-Arjani
Botany and Microbiology Department, College of Science, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2460, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia
Abdulaziz A. Alqarawi
Plant Production Department, College of Food and Agricultural Sciences, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2460, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia
Mashail Fahad S. Alsayed
Botany and Microbiology Department, College of Science, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2460, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia
Elsayed Fathi Abd_Allah
Plant Production Department, College of Food and Agricultural Sciences, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2460, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia
Jin Hu
Institute of Crop Sciences, College of Agriculture and Biotechnology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China
Yajing Guan
Institute of Crop Sciences, College of Agriculture and Biotechnology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China
This research was performed to explore the vital role of seed priming with a 0.01 µM concentration of brassinosteroids (EBL) to alleviate the adverse effects of Cr (100 µM) in two different rice cultivars. Seed priming with EBL significantly enhanced the germination attributes (germination percentage, germination energy, germination index, and vigor index, etc.), photosynthetic rate as well as plant growth (shoot and root length including the fresh and dry weight) under Cr toxicity as compared to the plants primed with water. Cr toxicity induced antioxidant enzyme activities (SOD, POD, CAT, and APX) and ROS level (MDA and H2O2 contents) in both rice cultivars; however, a larger increment was observed in YLY-689 (tolerant) than CY-927 (sensitive) cultivar. EBL application stimulatingly increased antioxidant enzyme activities to scavenge ROS production under Cr stress. The gene expression of SOD and POD in EBL-primed rice plants followed a similar increasing trend as observed in the case of enzymatic activities of SOD and POD compared to water-primed rice plants. Simultaneously, Cr uptake was observed to be significantly higher in the water-primed control compared to plants primed with EBL. Moreover, Cr uptake was significant in YLY-689 compared to CY-927. In ultra-structure studies, it was observed that EBL priming relieved the rice plants from sub-cellular damage. Conclusively, our research indicated that seed priming with EBL could be adopted as a promising strategy to enhance rice growth by copping the venomous effect of Cr.
