Mitigation of salinity stress in barley genotypes with variable salt tolerance by application of zinc oxide nanoparticles

Basharat Ali; Muhammad Hamzah Saleem; Shafaqat Ali; Munazzam Shahid; Muhammad Sagir; Muhammad Bilal Tahir; Kamal Ahmad Qureshi; Mariusz Jaremko; Samy Selim; Afzal Hussain; Muhammad Rizwan; Wajid Ishaq; M Zia-Ur Rehman

doi:10.3389/fpls.2022.973782

Mitigation of salinity stress in barley genotypes with variable salt tolerance by application of zinc oxide nanoparticles

Front Plant Sci. 2022 Aug 22:13:973782. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2022.973782. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Basharat Ali^{1

2

3}, Muhammad Hamzah Saleem⁴, Shafaqat Ali^{5

6}, Munazzam Shahid⁷, Muhammad Sagir¹, Muhammad Bilal Tahir¹, Kamal Ahmad Qureshi⁸, Mariusz Jaremko⁹, Samy Selim¹⁰, Afzal Hussain^{5

11}, Muhammad Rizwan⁵, Wajid Ishaq¹², M Zia-Ur Rehman²

Affiliations

¹ Khwaja Fareed University of Engineering and Information Technology (KFUEIT), Rahim Yar Khan, Pakistan.
² Faculty of Agriculture, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad, Pakistan.
³ Institute of Crop Science and Resource Conservation (INRES), University of Bonn, Bonn, Germany.
⁴ College of Plant Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, China.
⁵ Department of Environmental Sciences and Engineering, Government College University Faisalabad, Faisalabad, Pakistan.
⁶ Department of Biological Science and Technology, China Medical University, Taichung City, Taiwan.
⁷ Department of Environmental Sciences, University of Jhang, Jhang, Pakistan.
⁸ Department of Pharmaceutics, Unaizah College of Pharmacy, Qassim University, Unaizah, Saudi Arabia.
⁹ Smart-Health Initiative (SHI) and Red Sea Research Center (RSRC), Division of Biological and Environmental Sciences and Engineering (BESE), King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal, Saudi Arabia.
¹⁰ Department of Clinical Laboratory Sciences, College of Applied Medical Sciences, Jouf University, Sakaka, Saudi Arabia.
¹¹ Department of Environmental Sciences, The University of Lahore, Lahore, Pakistan.
¹² Nuclear Institute for Agriculture and Biology, Faisalabad, Pakistan.

Abstract

Salinity has become a major environmental concern of agricultural lands, impairing crop production. The current study aimed to examine the role of zinc oxide nanoparticles (ZnO NPs) in reducing the oxidative stress induced by salinity and the overall improvement in phytochemical properties in barley. A total of nine different barley genotypes were first subjected to salt (NaCl) stress in hydroponic conditions to determine the tolerance among the genotypes. The genotype Annora was found as most sensitive, and the most tolerant genotype was Awaran 02 under salinity stress. In another study, the most sensitive (Annora) and tolerant (Awaran 02) barley genotypes were grown in pots under salinity stress (100 mM). At the same time, half of the pots were provided with the soil application of ZnO NPs (100 mg kg^-1), and the other half pots were foliar sprayed with ZnO NPs (100 mg L^-1). Salinity stress reduced barley growth in both genotypes compared to control plants. However, greater reduction in barley growth was found in Annora (sensitive genotype) than in Awaran 02 (tolerant genotype). The exogenous application of ZnO NPs ameliorated salt stress and improved barley biomass, photosynthesis, and antioxidant enzyme activities by reducing oxidative damage caused by salt stress. However, this positive effect by ZnO NPs was observed more in Awaran 02 than in Annora genotype. Furthermore, the foliar application of ZnO NPs was more effective than the soil application of ZnO NPs. Findings of the present study revealed that exogenous application of ZnO NPs could be a promising approach to alleviate salt stress in barley genotypes with different levels of salinity tolerance.

Keywords: antioxidant machinery; barley; nanoparticles; oxidative stress; plant growth; salt stress.