International Journal of Agricultural Science Research Vol. 4(8), pp. 150-157, August 2015 ISSN 2327-3321 ©2015 Academe Research Journals

Full Length Research Paper

Genotypic variation in morphological and physiological response of soybean to waterlogging at flowering stage

Nguyen Van Loc^1,2, Vu Tien Binh¹, Dinh Thai Hoang¹, Toshihiro Mochizuki² and Nguyen Viet Long^1*

¹Faculty of Agronomy, Vietnam National University of Agriculture, Vietnam.

 ²Faculty of Agriculture, Kyushu University, Japan

*Corresponding author. E-mail: nvlong@vnua.edu.vn.

Accepted 4 August, 2015

Abstract

The experiment was conducted in greenhouse conditions at Vietnam National University of Agriculture to investigate genotypic variation in morphological and physiological responses of five soybean cultivars to waterlogging at the flowering stage. Seeds of each cultivar were sown in pots containing 6 kg dry soil. At early flowering stage, treatment pots were subjected to waterlogging by maintaining the water level of 3 cm above the soil surface for ten days. The results showed that the nodule number, nodule dry weight, chlorophyll content, carbon exchange rate, dry matter accumulation and nitrogen content were significantly reduced in waterlogging conditions. Among soybean cultivars, D140 and D912 showed better root length, nitrogen accumulation and total biomass under waterlogging conditions. Breeding for higher root growth, maintaining high nitrogen accumulation and total biomass could be an important strategy to improve soybean cultivar for waterlogging tolerance.

Key words: Flooding, flowering stage, nodule bacteria, soybean.