Mancozeb Induced Changes in Carbohydrate Metabolism of Paddy Cultivars during Seed Germination

Fungicides may cause oxidative stress in plants. Plants adapt to stress by different mechanism including changes in physiological and biological processes. Carbohydrates are considered as important metabolites in plants under stress condition. The reduction in their synthesis may affect plant growth and yield. The present work is an attempt to understand the effect of different concentrations of mancozeb on carbohydrate metabolism in paddy cultivars. Seed treatment with mancozeb influenced different aspects both at morphological and biochemical level. The study was carried out for 14 days after soaking the seeds in different concentrations of mancozeb and control was maintained. There was considerable significant positive increase in starch content, reducing sugar, β-amylase and invertase enzyme activities in Jyothi cultivar. Thus mancozeb acts as stimulatory effector. This may be adoptive measure under stress condition. Where as in Jaya and IR-64 cultivar, mancozeb treatment was found to be having detrimental effect.