Tikoria Raman, Ohri Puja
Department of Zoology, Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar, 143005, India.
Department of Zoology, School of Bio-engineering and Biosciences, Lovely Professional University, Phagwara, Punjab, 144411, India.
Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2023 Oct 21. doi: 10.1007/s11356-023-30324-y.
Farming, food processing, animal husbandry and other agro-based activities contribute to global environmental degradation by producing millions of tons of organic and inorganic solid waste. In terms of sustainable agriculture, agricultural waste management and conversion into useful products are essential. In addition, plants are facing various kinds of biotic stress, which ultimately affects their defense system. Altered defense systems in plants ultimately lead to the death of plants and a reduction in crop production. The present study is designed to keep the abovementioned fact in mind, which mainly focuses on the reuse of agricultural waste and its application to the antioxidant potential and structural components of tomato plants during nematode stress. In the present study, neem leaves were collected and mixed with cattle dung for the preparation of vermicompost. Then, tomato seeds were pre-treated with vermicompost extract before being germinated in earthen pots. After germination, they were transplanted to separate pots and inoculated with freshly hatched juveniles of Meloidogyne incognita. The experiments were conducted for 10 days under glass house conditions, and after that, plants were harvested and various physiological (antioxidant capacity, percent electrolyte leakage) and structural markers (carbohydrate content, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy) were analyzed. Results revealed that all physico-chemical properties make vermicompost superior as compared to soil and pre-compost material. Further, nematode stress leads to altered physiological and structural markers as compared to uninfected seedlings. However, treatment with vermicompost significantly increases carbohydrate content and antioxidative capacity in a concentration dependent manner. In addition, electrolyte leakage was found to be decrease with an increase in the concentration of vermicompost. All these findings conclude that vermicompost has strong potential to limit the damage caused by nematodes and boost the antioxidant potential of the host plants. Further, this study provides strong evidence for using vermicompost as an eco-friendly alternative to chemical nematicides and a potential strategy for agricultural waste management. This is the first study in which the tomato plant's structural and physiological markers were assessed during nematode stress after being supplemented with vermicompost under glass house conditions for an initial 10 days of nematode exposure.
农业、食品加工、畜牧业及其他以农业为基础的活动产生了数百万吨有机和无机固体废物，这加剧了全球环境退化。就可持续农业而言，农业废弃物管理及将其转化为有用产品至关重要。此外，植物正面临各种生物胁迫，这最终会影响其防御系统。植物防御系统的改变最终会导致植物死亡并使作物产量降低。本研究旨在牢记上述事实，主要关注农业废弃物的再利用及其在番茄植株遭受线虫胁迫期间对抗氧化潜力和结构成分的应用。在本研究中，收集印楝叶并与牛粪混合以制备蚯蚓堆肥。然后，番茄种子在陶土盆中发芽前用蚯蚓堆肥提取物进行预处理。发芽后，将它们移植到单独的花盆中，并接种南方根结线虫刚孵化出的幼虫。实验在温室条件下进行10天，之后收获植株并分析各种生理指标（抗氧化能力、电解质渗漏率）和结构指标（碳水化合物含量、傅里叶变换红外光谱）。结果表明，与土壤和堆肥前的材料相比，所有理化性质都使蚯蚓堆肥更具优势。此外，与未感染的幼苗相比，线虫胁迫导致生理和结构指标发生变化。然而，用蚯蚓堆肥处理以浓度依赖的方式显著增加了碳水化合物含量和抗氧化能力。此外，发现电解质渗漏随着蚯蚓堆肥浓度的增加而减少。所有这些发现表明，蚯蚓堆肥具有强大的潜力来限制线虫造成的损害并提高寄主植物的抗氧化潜力。此外，本研究为使用蚯蚓堆肥作为化学杀线虫剂的环保替代品以及农业废弃物管理的潜在策略提供了有力证据。这是第一项在温室条件下，在最初10天的线虫暴露期用蚯蚓堆肥处理后评估番茄植株在遭受线虫胁迫期间的结构和生理指标的研究。
