Potato minituber pelleting new way to improve some key traits of potatoes

Pelleting is done by adding inert adsorbents to change seed size and shape and improve seed yield and plant ability. This present study was conducted to investigate potato minituber pelleting (Agria cultivar) to improve some key potato traits in a randomized complete block design with three replications in the research farm of Mohaghegh Ardabili University in 2018-2019. Experimental treatments included 9 different combinations of Arabic gum or cellulose adhesive, zeolite or cocopeat fillers and chitosan with control treatment (without pellets). The studied traits were leaf number of leaves, fresh yield, dry matter yield of potato tuber, leaf stomatal conductance, tuber carbohydrate content, tuber density and chlorophyll content in leaves. The results showed a significant effect of potato minituber pelleting on traits such as Number of leaves, Fresh and dry matter yield of potato tubers, leaf stomatal conductance, tuber acidity, density and chlorophyll b content. Pelleting of minitubers with Arabic gum + zeolite + chitosan had the highest number of leaves and density of potato tubers it showed an increase of 50.88 and 15.9 percent, respectively to the control treatment. According to the results, the highest fresh yield and dry matter yield of potato tuber were obtained in the treatment of Arabic gum with zeolite, which showed an increase of 47.14 and 39.46 percent, respectively, compared to the control. The highest amount of leaf stomatal conductance was observed in the cellulose adhesive + cocopeat treatment combination, which resulted in a 70.21% increase compared to the control treatment. The highest amount of chlorophyll b in cellulose adhesive + cocopeat + chitosan treatment combination showed an increase of 42.7% respectively, compared to the control treatment. In general, in terms of quantitative traits, application of Arabic gum with zeolite along with chitosan led to the improvement of most morphological, functional and physiological traits.