The effect of folic acid on yield and some qualities parameters of wheat

Background and Nowadays malnutrition due to low food diversity is a serious problem in developing countries like Iran. Due to important role of wheat in nutrition of these countries, researchers try to produce wheat grains with higher proteins, amino acids, iron and zinc content, providing essential body nutrients and as a result reduce malnutrition. Considering the role of folic acid in transfer of single carbon fragments and its effect on improvement of metabolic processes, in this research effect of external application of folic acid on the quality and yield of wheat grains were investigated.
Material and Kohdasht wheat cultivar was planted in a farm experiment conducted at research farm of Maragheh University in early spring of 2013 using randomized complete block design with three treatments with density of 500 seeds per m2. The three treatments were as follows: control (without application of folic acid), priming of seeds with 25 µM Solution of folic acid accompanying leaf spraying in steming stage. The third one was the same as second one except leaf spraying in heading stage. Folic acid spraying is carried out in the final hours of day by a pump sprayer. 100 mL of solution was sprayed per each square meter.
Finding: Results revealed that folic acid external application had following advantages compared to control: firstly, increase the yield of grain, Secondly, protein, essential amino acids, iIron content of grain is increased meaningfully and finally cause to increase the chlorophyll content in flag leaf.
In this research the effects of external application of folic acid have been studied on whole grain, but part of accumulated iron along with proteins during flour preparation process have been omitted. However considering positive impact of external application of folic acid on quality of grains and on proteins, amino acids, iron content of them, we can claim that this method was a short-term solution for both improving quality and quantity of food and reducing adverse effect of malnutrition.