Effects of salicylic acid and manganese sulphate effects on morphological and biochemical traits of Portulaca oleracea L.

Portulaca oleracea L., belonging to the Portulacaceae family, has a high nutritional value due to omega-3 and 6, antioxidants and Tocopherols. In addition, it has beneficial effects on preventing cardiovascular disease and cancer. On the other hand, effect of salicylic acid and micronutrients on growth, efficiency, physiological traits and resistance to disease, led us to study the effectiveness of this plant hormone and manganese sulfate on some of the traits of this valuable medicinal plant. The project was implemented in Imam Khomeini Higher Education Center of Jihad-e-Agriculture University, Karaj, Iran in 2015. The study was conducted in a factorial based on randomized complete block design with three replications. The influence of different levels of salicylic acid (0, 0.1, 0.5, 1 and 2 millimolar) and manganese sulfate (0, 0.5 and 1 g/lit) was investigated on length of main-stem, number of sub-branches, herbal fresh weight, number of seeds per capsule, number of capsules per bush, chlorophyll, carotenoids and vitamin C. Analysis of variance showed that the treatments studied had significant effects on all morphological and biochemical traits (α≤0.05). The highest number of seeds per capsule (66.44) was obtained through 1 mM of salicylic acid and 1 g/lit of manganese sulfate. The interaction effect of salicylic acid and manganese sulfate indicated that 2 mM of salicylic acid and 1 g/lit of manganese sulfate had the highest carotenoids content (0.071 mg). In general, results showed that appropriate concentrations of salicylic acid and manganese sulfate had positive and significant effect on improvement of the study traits.