Validating Protocol and Deciphering the Nanoparticulate Seed Treatment in Enhancing Seed Quality of Soybean, Pigeon Pea and Groundnut

Silicon nanoparticles have attracted huge interest as a rapidly growing class of materials for many agricultural applications. It provided new insight of the potential growth promoting effects of the nanoparticle (SiO­2) on plant system. Looking in to its importance, a comprehensive study was conducted to standardize the protocol on method of seed treatment with Silicon dioxide (SiO2) nanoparticle for enhancing seed quality in soybean, groundnut and pigeon pea. Among the treatment combinations, soybean, groundnut and pigeon pea seeds treated with SiO2 nanoparticle in powder form along with polymer found to be superior for all the tested seed quality parameters viz., germination (95.00, 95.33 and 94.67%), seedling length (39.60, 35.14, 25.56cm), mean seedling dry weight (45.53, 28.33 and 50.47mg/seedling), seedling vigour index-I (3763, 3348 and 2421), seedling vigour index-II (4332, 2700 and 4780) for soybean, pigeon pea and groundnut, respectively. However, compared to untreated control, these seed quality attributes were statistically on par with CMC+NP treatment. These findings suggested that seed treatment with SiO2 nanoparticle in powder form along with polymer coating significantly enhanced seed quality of soybean, groundnut, and pigeon pea.