Researcher(s)
- Tyler Sosnoski, Plant Science, University of Delaware
Faculty Mentor(s)
- Qi Mu, Department of Plant and Soil Sciences, University of Delaware
Abstract
During and after flood events, the primary cause of damage to plants growing in affected soils is the depletion of oxygen. Water replaces the oxygen in soil’s pores, and creates an anaerobic environment. Plant roots need oxygen to survive, so extended periods of stagnant water can result in root damage, limiting the flow of water and nutrients to the rest of the plant. This can lead to stunted development, and make plants more vulnerable to additional stressors later in the growing season.To ensure maize production is not hindered by increasing extreme and unpredictable weather patterns resulting from climate change, new lines are needed that tolerate these waterlogged soils. This experiment sets out to analyze the different phenotypic traits affected by flood conditions, and identify genotypes that perform well. The field in which the experiment was conducted is located at the University of Delaware farm, and was arranged in a randomized complete block design, with two blocks per treatment (flood and control). 126 genotypes, along with 18 tropicalS which were planted in 2 row plots, resulting in a total of 144 plots per block. Each genotype was screened for SPAD value and other photosynthesis related traits, height, stem count, and flowering to analyze the effect flooding has on each respectively. Analysis of these traits shows that flooding has a significant effect on the SPAD value of affected maize plants, as well as the height of certain lines. ANOVA analysis was used to test traits with respect to rep, treatment, and genotype as well as the interaction between them. Research is still ongoing, so a complete set of stem count and flowering data is not available at this time. So far, genotypes that performed similar among control and flood groups are CML 10, CML-277, G-5, Iltis30919, Ki11, NILASq2g41i04s1, and NILASq4g22io2s1.