Effect of Super water absorbent (SWA) hydrogel on productivity and quality of Tomato

摘要

In this work, superwater absorbent hydrogel (SWA) based on polysaccharide was prepared from aqueous solution of carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC)/acrylamide with radiation processing technology using Co-60 gamma source at room temperature (~ 27ºC). When SWA is mixed with soil, the morphological study i.e., plant height, weight of roots, number of branch, number of leaves and yield of fruits of tomato plant showed higher values than that of the soil without SWA. It has also been observed that with and without SWA the elemental properties of soil gave almost the same values meaning that adding SWA did not affect the properties of soil. Regarding the quality of fruit, the food value (i. e., protein, ascorbic acid, iron) of green tomato showedno significant changes with and without SWA, although the significant increase in total phenol content of green tomato grown in SWA mixed soil indicates better antioxidative quality.