Evaluation of the potential of Azospirillum brasilense to increase nitrogen use efficiency in maize

• Grant number: 17/26121-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: April 01, 2018
• End date: March 31, 2019
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Agronomy - Crop Science
• Principal Investigator: Gustavo Vitti Moro
• Grantee: Laís Cozer Araujo
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Ciências Agrárias e Veterinárias (FCAV). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Jaboticabal. Jaboticabal , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Nitrogen is the nutrient that most influences maize yield, and is, therefore, one of the main constraints to increased grain yield, especially in developing countries. This fact, coupled with the low uptake efficiency of the cultivars, makes it necessary to increase the nitrogen uptake efficiency. Studies have shown that inoculation with the genus Azospirillum bacteria benefit root growth and therefore has the potential to increase the nitrogen uptake efficiency of the crop, but the response to Azospirillum has genotype specificity, and studies need to be conducted to see whether the increase of efficiency if it occurs, is uniform among genotypes. In view of the above, the objective of the work will be to verify the effect of inoculation with Azospirillum brasilense on root development and nitrogen use efficiency, and on the development of seedlings in commercial maize hybrids. The experiment to evaluate the effect of Azospirillum on seedling development will be conducted in a 5 x 2 factorial scheme, with five commercial hybrids and absence and presence of inoculation with Azospirillum in the seed, evaluating seedling parameters at 7 days. The experiment to evaluate the effect of Azospirillum on the nitrogen use efficiency will be conducted in a 5 x 3 factorial scheme, being five commercial hybrids and three forms of inoculation (without inoculation, inoculation via seed and inoculation via soil in V5 stage). The plants will be collected at the V8 stage to determine the parameters related to efficiency. The results will be analyzed through analysis of variance, Tukey test, and GT Biplot. (AU)