Physiological and Biochemical Changes During Seed Deterioration in Aged Seeds of Rice (Oryza sativa L.)

The present study was carried out in five rice varieties viz. Pusa-1, Sugandha-4, Sugandha-5, Saket-4 and Saket-370, for analyzing the varietals differences during seed deterioration by subjected them to Accelerated Ageing (AA) at 45°C and 100% relative humidity (RH) for 24, 48, 72 and 96 h. Various physiological parameters such as moisture content, germination percentage, seedling vigour, vigour index and biochemical parameters such as reducing sugar based on DNS assay, soluble protein by Lowry’s method were explored. Different levels of seed vigor were obtained with different varieties and duration of accelerated aging treatments. Prolongation of ageing led to deterioration of both germinability and seed viability. The physiological results were coinciding with the biochemical parameters. Ageing conditions resulted in increased moisture content in all the varieties. The study concludes that accelerated ageing showed effect on seed quality of all the varieties of rice. All the test experiments performed concluded that Sugandha-4 is the best variety, followed by Saket-370 among all five varieties and Sugandha-5 and Saket-4 are highly sensitive varieties with respect to accelerated ageing.