Influence of essential oils on the quality of Vigna unguiculata L. (Walp.) seeds compared by traditional method, image and multivariate analysis.

Abstract

The extracts of medicinal plants are used for the treatment of seeds in order to reduce the action of phytopathogens and increase the vigor of the seeds. Currently, computerized image analysis has been used to assess the physiological quality of seed lots. The objective was to evaluate the efficiency of the Vigor-S® software in the evaluation of the physiological quality of cowpea seeds treated with essential oils, comparing with a traditional test and the principal component analysis. Two cowpea cultivars were analyzed, BRS Tumucumaque and BRS Guariba, treated with doses of natural extracts of Alfavaca, garlic, horsetail, citronella and pyroligneous acid. The traditional method consisted of evaluations for germination, first germination count, seedling emergence, emergence speed index, accelerated aging, fresh matter and dry matter of seedling and the image analysis for: seedling length, growth index, uniformity index, vigor index, and germination. A Principal component analysis was applied to reduce the number of variables. Horsetail, Alfavaca and citronella extracts were efficient in increasing the physiological quality of the seeds of at least one cultivar. The Vigor-S® software proved to be efficient compared to traditional tests to assess the physiological quality of seeds. Principal Component Analysis is an ally to identify the best extracts and doses to be used. The image analysis method proved to be effective when compared to the traditional method and can therefore be used.

Plant phenotyping relevance

Vigor-S®画像解析による種子・幼植物の生理的品質評価を従来法と比較検証しており、画像ベースの表現型取得・解析が中心的に扱われている。

Code and data availability

The supplied blocks contain no public phenotype dataset, seed images, author analysis code, or supplement with paper-specific assets. The paper uses the third-party Vigor-S software and R for PCA, but no availability/deposit statement or authors' URL for data or code is provided; all URLs in the text are citations to a

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