Effect of Salicylic Acid and Methyl Jasmonate on Stress Indices in Papaver bracteatum Lindl

Persian poppy (Papaver bracteatum Lindl.) is a perennial medicinal plant belonging to the Papaveraceae family that is endemic to the mountainous areas in Northern Iran. It is known for high amounts of the valuable benzylisoquinoline alkaloid thebaine. In this study, the effect of salicylic acid and methyl jasmonate elicitors on stress indices was investigated. For this purpose, an experiment was conducted in the form of a factorial experiment with a randomized complete block design on three different populations of Persian poppies. The interactions of the population×salicylic acid×methyl jasmonate were significant (level of 1%) among the chlorophyll fluorescence, ion leakage, malondialdehyde, and proline indices. The highest Fv/Fm (0.838) was observed in the German population and 100 μM salicylic acid treatment. The lowest ion leakage (20.51%) was observed in the polour population and 100 μM methyl jasmonate treatment. The lowest amount of malondialdehyde (19.36 mM/g fresh weight) was observed in Fil zamin population and 100 μM salicylic acid treatment. The highest amount of proline (6.29 μmol/g fresh weight) was also observed in the polour population and 100 μM salicylic acid treatment. In general, salicylic acid and methyl jasmonate treatments were shown to improve stress-related indices well. It seems that the best treatments to increase plant capacity to deal with environmental stresses are 100 μM salicylic acid and 100 μM methyl jasmonate in Persian poppy.