Evaluation of Physiological and Biochemical Traits in Relation to Sodicity Tolerance in Selected Rice Genotypes under Different Sodicity Levels

Background: Soil sodicity is becoming a serious problem which is increasing every year has a negative impact the physical and nutritional qualities of the soil and plant which has an immense adverse effect on crop growth. Sodicity tolerance includes the manifestation of biochemical and physiological variations. Understanding these physiological and biochemical mechanism in rice is one of the biological solution for increasing the yield of crops through increased tolerance mechanism. Methods: A field experiment was conducted at Anbil Dharmalingam Agricultural College and Research Institute, Tiruchirappalli, Tamil Nadu to evaluate the performance of different rice varieties i.e., TRY 1, CO 43, TRY 2, CSR 27, TRY 3, white ponni (WP) with particular reference to Exchangeable Sodium Percentage (ESP) at various levels viz., ESP 8, 16, 24, 32, 40 and 48 and its impact on physiological and biochemical components. Plant samples were collected at flowering stage was analyzed for chlorophyll, sugars and proline content. Grain and straw yield of the crop was recorded. Result: The Chlorophyll and non-reducing sugars showed decreasing trend with increasing ESP levels but proline, reducing sugar and total sugar showed an increasing trend with increasing sodicity levels. The variation in biochemical and physiological components had significantly affected the growth and yield of rice crop. Among different rice varieties TRY 3 was found to be superior at increasing sodicity levels..