The effects of water deficit and polymer on some physiological traits in corn (Zea mays L.)

Drought stress is the most important problem of agriculture in the wide world arid and semiarid areas. The application of some material such as superabsorbent polymers in soil could increase water retention in soil and decrease leaching of water and fertilizer. This experiment was conducted on corn (Zea mays L.) in Dashtak, Zahedan during growing 2012-2013. The experiment was carried out as split-plot with two factors including three irrigation regimes including irrigated with 60%, 80% and 100% crop evapotranspiration (ETc) respectively as main plots and four amounts of superabsorbent polymer (SAP) including 0, 30, 60 and 90 kg ha(-1) as subplots in a completely randomized block design with three replications. The results showed that the effect of irrigation regimes, SAP levels and interaction between two factors had significant effect on all traits. The regression models estimated for relative water content (RWC), chlorophyll index (CI), remobilization of photosynthetic matters (RPM), portion of remobilization to seed and seed yield showed that applying SAP in 100% ETc treatment had no different effect on above traits, but in the treatments which were exposed with water deficit improved all the traits of corn. The results also showed that applying 60 kg ha(-1) SAP decreased corn's water requirement as much as 20% and caused a seed yield and physiological characters equivalent to the 100% irrigation treatment.