Effect of Salinity on Growth, Xylem Structure and Anatomical Characteristics of Soybean

Abstract

This research was conducted in order to evaluation the salinity stress effect on growth parameters and stem anatomical changes of soybean grown under controlled conditions. Soybean seeds were surface sterilized and then sown into plastic pots filled up with perlite and vermiculite. Seeds were irrigated with Broughton and Dilworth solution daily. At full folded cotyledons stage (5 day after sowing), salinity stress was induced by adding NaCl into nutrition solution with final concentration of 0, 25, 50 and 100 mM. Thirty days after sowing plants were harvested and growth parameters and anatomical changes were evaluated. The results showed that, salinity stress was significantly decreased shoot and root weight either fresh weight or dry weight, in addition, total plant weight, plant height and leaf number were decreased due to salinity stress. Interestingly, leaf area was not affected by salinity stress. Stem microscopic study demonstrated that, salinity stress significantly increased cutin mass and trichome density on epidermal cells. On the other hand, cortex thickness was decreased because of salinity stress while xylem thickness had upward increase when soybean plants were grown under salinity stress especially high level of salinity. Additionally, there were changed in xylem formation and arrangement in stressed plants.