Effect of maternal light environment of Lithospermum arvense on offspring germinability.

LONGÁS, MARÍA DE LAS MERCEDES; CHANTRE, GUILLERMO RUBÉN; LODOVICHI, MARIELA; SABBATINI, MARIO RICARDO

Hangzhou

Congreso; VI International Weed Science Congress; 2012

International Weed Science Society.

Lithospermum arvense is a weedy annual species of winter cereal crops of the south-west area of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Maternal environmental factors, such as light, may affect seed development having consequences on the variance of fitness components like seed dormancy. The aim of this work was to investigate the effect of light intensities of the maternal environment on seed germinability of the progeny. Plants of L. arvense were grown under full sun and 37% neutral shade. Freshly matured seeds (F1) were stored dry in darkness at 25 °C until 589 °C.day of after-ripening. Germination trials were carried out in a growth chamber under a constant thermal regime (15ºC) either under complete darkness or under a 14-h photoperiod. Seeds were incubated in 9-cmdiameter plastic Petri dishes either with 5 ml of distiller water or with a NO3K solution (2% w/w). A factorial design with three factors was established: maternal environment (100 and 63% light availability), incubation photoperiod and incubation medium (distilled water or NO3K solution). Dishes were wrapped in aluminum foil so as to exclude light. Germination was assessed after 12 and 16 days of incubation. A positive interaction between maternal environment and incubation photoperiod was observed (p < 0.05) with slightly increasing trend to more germination under complete darkness conditions. Neither a medium environmental effect nor a maternal light effect was observed (p>0.05). Further studies should be conducted in order to evaluate possible fitness effect of light maternal environment on future generations (F2, F3, F4).