Extensive Desiccation and Aging Stress Tolerance Characterize Gaillardia pulchella (Asteraceae) Seeds

Abstract

<jats:p>We investigated the response of <jats:italic>Gaillardia pulchella</jats:italic> seeds to desiccation and aging stress to gain some perspective on the germplasm storage potential and seed vigor of this species. Seed–water relations of mature, freshly harvested <jats:italic>G. pulchella</jats:italic> seeds were characteristic of desiccation-tolerant species. For example, initial seed water potential (−53 MPa) was well below the lethal water potential limit (−15 MPa) for desiccation-sensitive seeds. Desiccation tolerance was confirmed by high (&gt;70%), rapid (<jats:italic>t</jats:italic><jats:sub>50</jats:sub> range 4–7 days), and uniform germination following equilibration drying. Likewise, post–saturated salt accelerated aging (SSAA) germination tests indicated a high degree of vigor of fresh seeds. The substantial level of desiccation and aging-related stress tolerance in <jats:italic>G. pulchella</jats:italic> seeds suggests that these organs potentially display orthodox storage physiology and an ability to endure variable seed bed conditions.</jats:p>

Your P-values are significant (or not), so what … now what?

“…This means that the odds of fungal contamination in seeds treated with fungicide A is 86% higher than the odds for fungal contamination in seeds treated with fungicide B. Similarly, the hazard ratio (HR), which is associated with regression-based time-to-event analyses in seed biology (McNair et al, 2012;Pérez and Kettner, 2013;Genna et al, 2015;Adegbola and Pérez, 2016;Genna and Pérez, 2016;Pérez and Kane, 2017;Tyler et al, 2017;Campbell-Martínez et al, 2019;Pérez and Chumana, 2020), represents the ratio of estimated hazard rates (i.e., likelihood of germination) between different covariate values (e.g., doses of a germination-stimulating chemical; treated vs. control) over a unit of time (Allison, 2010). Consider an experiment from a germination perspective where a group of seeds received an increasing dose of a germination inhibitor.…”