Effects of Salinity Stress on Growth of Lettuce (Lactuca sativa) under Closed-recycle Nutrient Film Technique

Soil and water salinity are amongst major limiting factors affecting crop growth, quality and yield throughout the world. An experiment was conducted to investigate the effects of salinity stress (NaCl) on growth of lettuce (Lactuca sativa L.) cv. Paris Islands Cos under closed-recycled nutrient film technique (NFT). Different salinity levels i.e. 50 mM and 100 mM along with control (0 mM) were used. It was observed that number of leaves, plant fresh weight, shoot fresh weight, shoot dry weight, shoot dry matter percentage, root fresh weight, root dry weight, root dry weight percentage, leaf area and leaf area index were significantly effected by salinity levels, while shoot and root water contents percentage, ratio of the shoot to root fresh weight and ratio of the shoot to root dry weight showed insignificant effect in response to salinity. Overall studies revealed that lettuce is sensitive to salt stress in NFT, which resulted in poor growth and quality of lettuce. © 2010 Friends Science Publishers