Cadmium mobility, uptake, and accumulation in spinach, kale, and amaranths vegetables as influenced by silicon fertilization

Silicon is not considered an essential element for plant development and growth, but its absorption brings several benefits to some crops, especially rice, by increasing cellular wall thickness, providing mechanical resistance to the penetration of fungi, improving the opening angle of leaves and making them more erect, decreasing self-shading and increasing resistance to lodging, especially under high nitrogen rates. To evaluate the effects of nitrogen and silicon fertilization on vegetative and yield components, plant height, and yield of rice cultivar IAC 202, an experiment was carried out combining three nitrogen rates (5, 75 and 150 mg N kg-1 soil) applied as urea, and four silicon rates (0, 200, 400 and 600 mg SiO2 kg-1 soil) applied as calcium silicate. Trial was set up in a completely randomized design 3 ´ 4 factorial scheme, (N = 5). Nitrogen fertilization increased the number of stems and panicles per square meter and the total number of spikelets, reflecting on grain productivity. Excessive tillering caused by inadequate nitrogen fertilization reduced the percentage of fertile stalks, spikelet fertility and grain mass. Silicon fertilization reduced the number of blank spikelets per panicles and increased grain mass, but did not affect grain productivity.

Download Full-text

Phytomass and quality of yellow passion fruit seedlings under salt stress and silicon fertilization

Comunicata Scientiae ◽

10.14295/cs.v11i0.3400 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 11 ◽

pp. e3400

Author(s):

Genilson Lima Diniz ◽

Reginaldo Gomes Nobre ◽

Geovani Soares de Lima ◽

Leandro de Pádua Souza ◽

Lauriane Almeida dos Anjos Soares ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Electrical Conductivity ◽

Salt Stress ◽

Block Design ◽

Passion Fruit ◽

Northeastern Brazil ◽

Shoot Ratio ◽

Root Shoot Ratio ◽

Silicon Fertilization ◽

Plant Nursery

The semiarid region of Northeastern Brazil is characterized by long drought periods, and the use of saline waters appears as an alternative for the expansion of irrigated areas. Associated with the use of these waters, silicon fertilization constitutes an important attenuator of salt stress. In this perspective, this study aimed to evaluate the phytomass production and quality of the passion fruit cultivar ‘Gigante Amarelo’ grown with saline water and silicon fertilization. The experiment was conducted in a plant nursery belonging to the Center of Agrifood Science and Technology, in the municipality of Pombal-PB. A completely randomized block design in a 5 x 5 factorial scheme was used, referring to five levels of electrical conductivity of the irrigation water (0.3, 1.0, 1.7, 2.4, and 3.1 dS m-1) and five doses of silicon fertilization (0; 25; 50; 75, and 100 g of potassium silicate/plant), with four replications and two plants per plot. The phytomass accumulation (leaves, stem, and roots), as well as the total dry phytomass, shoot dry phytomass, root/shoot ratio, and the quality index of Dickson were evaluated. The data obtained were subjected to the F-test at 0.01 and 0.05 level of probability. The electrical conductivity of water from 0.3 dS m-1 caused the decrease of phytomass production in seedlings of the passion fruit cultivar ‘Gigante Amarelo’, although it is possible to produce good quality passion fruit seedlings with water salinity up to 3.1 dS m-1. The doses of silicon fertilization mitigated the effect of salt stress on the root/shoot ratio of plants of the passion fruit cultivar ‘Gigante Amarelo’.

Download Full-text

Effect of forest management on the formation and stability of phytolith and PhytOC in forest ecosystem

10.5194/egusphere-egu21-573 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Lin Xu ◽

Yongjun Shi ◽

Wanjie Lv ◽

Zhengwen Niu ◽

Ning Yuan ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Carbon Sequestration ◽

Forest Management ◽

Forest Ecosystem ◽

Management Practices ◽

Forest Ecosystems ◽

Moso Bamboo ◽

Soil System ◽

Silicon Fertilization ◽

Global Carbon

Forest ecosystem has a high carbon sequestration capacity and plays a crucial role in maintaining global carbon balance and climate change. Phytolith-occluded carbon (PhytOC), a promising long-term biogeochemical carbon sequestration mechanism, has attracted more attentions in the global carbon cycle and the regulation of atmospheric CO2. Therefore, it is of practical significance to investigate the PhytOC accumulation in forest ecosystems. Previous studies have mostly focused on the estimation of the content and storage of PhytOC, while there were still few studies on how the management practices affect the PhytOC content. Here, this study focused on the effects of four management practices (compound fertilization, silicon fertilization, cut and control) on the increase of phytolith and PhytOC in Moso bamboo forests. We found that silicon fertilization had a greater potential to significantly promote the capacity of carbon sequestration in Moso bamboo forests. this finding positively corresponds recent studies that the application of silicon fertilizers (e.g., biochar) increase the Si uptake1 to promote phytolith accumulation and its PhytOC sequestration in the plant-soil system2. Of course, the above-mentioned document2 also had their own shortcomings, i.e., the experimental research time was not long, lacking long-term follow-up trial and the bamboo forest parts were also limited, so that the test results lack certain reliability. We have set up a long-term experiment plot to study the effects of silicon fertilizer on the formation and stability of phytolith and PhytOC in Moso bamboo forests. But anyway, different forest management practices, especially the application of high-efficiency silicon-rich fertilizers1, may be an effective way to increase the phytolith and PhytOC storage in forest ecosystems, and thereby improve the long-term CO2 sequestration capacity of forest ecosystems. Research in this study provides a good "forest plan" to achieve their national voluntary emission reduction commitments and achieves carbon neutrality goals for all over the world.Refences:1Li et al., 2019. Plant and soil, 438(1-2), pp.187-203.2Huang et al., 2020, Science of The Total Environment, 715, p.136846.

Download Full-text