Growth and Certain Biochemical Components of Black Cumin Cultivated under Salinity Stress Factor

Black cumin used as a spice,food additive and medicinal proposes. cultivation of resistant plants is one way to utilize arid zones in egypt. so,an attempt was made to follow the effects of salt conditions on growth and some biochemical constituents of black cumin. black cumin plants were subjected to different levels of nacl salt,i.e. 0.4,1.6,3.1,4.7 and 6.3 ds m-1. plant growth characters (pgc) i.e. plant height,ph (cm),number of leaves,nl (plant1),number of branches,nb (plant1),number of capsules,nc (plant1) dry weight of herb (dwh) and yield of seeds,(ys) (plant1) were decreased as salinity level increased. the biochemical contents such as essential oil (eo),major constituents of eo (p-cymene,a-thujene and γ-terpinene),total soluble sugars (tss) and proline (pro) were promoted under salinity treatments while nitrogen (n) and crude protein (cp) were decreased. greatest pgc for all variables were obtained in the 0.4 dsm-1 treatment with the values of 16.5,43.9,4.6,8.5,20.8 and 4.4 respectively. the highest values of eo (0.4%),p-cymene (60.3%),a-thujene (7.2%),γ-terpinene (1.5 %),pro content (23.1 μm g-1) and tss (11.8%) were obtained from the 6.3 dsm-1 treatment. the highest values of n uptake and cp (0.4 μm g-1 and 16.5%) were recorded with 0.4 dsm-1 treatment.