Pre-sowing seed treated with Polyethylene Glycol (PEG) assumed to be a potential priming agent to increase the germination, seedling growth and water relation behavior of grain. With this view, a lab investigation was carried out to find out the effect of various PEG concentrations on the germination, seedling growth and water relation behavior of wheat. Seeds of ESWYT-5, ESWYT-6 and ESWYT-7 wheat genotypes and BARI Gom 28 were pre-soaked in water with 0%, 5%, 10%, 15% and 20% PEG solutions. Results of the study revealed that seed priming enhanced germination, seedling growth and water relation behavior of wheat genotypes. Among four wheat genotypes, ESWYT-5 performed the best regarding germination, seedling growth and water relation behavior where wheat genotypes ESWYT-6 and BARI Gom 28 performed moderately and ESWYT-7 showed consistently poor performance. All the characters showed the best results when wheat seeds treated with 10% PEG solution compared to nonprime and hydro primed seeds and the value decreased gradually with increasing PEG concentration. These results suggest that seed priming had significant effect to boost the germination, seedling growth and water relation behavior of wheat genotypes.

Pre-sowing seed treated with Polyethylene Glycol (PEG) believed to be a potential priming agent to increase the germination, seedling growth and water relation behavior of crop plants under salt stress condition. With this view, a lab investigation was carried out to find out the effect of PEG on the germination, seedling growth and water relation behavior of wheat under different salt levels. Seeds of ESWYT 5, ESWYT 6 wheat genotypes and BARI Gom 28 were pre-soaked in 10%PEG solutions for 9 h and allowed to grow under 5 levels of salt concentrations viz.,0, 5, 10, 15 and 20 dSm-1 .Findings of the research work showed that seed priming with 10% PEG solution for 9 h had significant effect on germination, seedling growth and water relation behavior of wheat genotypes under salt stress condition. Among three wheat genotypes, ESWYT 5 performed the best regarding germination, seedling growth and water relation behavior where wheat genotypes ESWYT-6 performed moderately and BARI Gom 28 showed poor performance. With increasing the salinity level the decreasing of germination, seedling growth and water relation behavior was normal phenomena but in this experiment, priming helped to reduce the magnitude of reduction. These results suggest that seed priming had significant effect to trigger the germination, seedling growth and water relation behavior of wheat genotypes under salt stress condition.