Automated Imaging to Evaluate the Exogenous Gibberellin (Ga 3 ) Impact on Seedlings from Salt-Stressed Lettuce Seeds.

Abstract

Salinity stress is a common challenge in plant growth, impacting seed quality, germination, and general plant health. Sodium chloride (NaCl) ions disrupt membranes, causing ion leakage and reducing seed viability. Gibberellic acid (GA 3 ) treatments have been found to promote germination and mitigate salinity stress on germination and plant growth. 'Bauer' and 'Muir' lettuce ( Lactuca sativa ) seeds were soaked in distilled water (control), 100 mM NaCl, 100 mM NaCl + 50 mg/L GA 3 , and 100 mM NaCl + 150 mg/L GA 3 in Petri dishes and kept in a dark growth chamber at 25 °C for 24 h. After germination, seedlings were monitored using embedded cameras, capturing red, green, and blue (RGB) images from seeding to final harvest. Despite consistent germination rates, 'Bauer' seeds treated with NaCl showed reduced germination. Surprisingly, the 'Muir' cultivar's final dry weight differed across treatments, with the NaCl and high GA 3 concentration combination yielding the poorest results ( p 3 applications in improving germination rates. However, at elevated concentrations, it induced excessive hypocotyl elongation and pale seedlings, posing challenges for two-dimensional imaging. Nonetheless, a sigmoidal regression model using projected canopy size accurately predicted dry weight across growth stages and cultivars, emphasizing its reliability despite treatment variations ( R 2 = 0.96, RMSE = 0.11, p < 0.001).

Code and data availability

The paper's phenotype data (PCS, germination, dry weight) and image analysis are not publicly deposited; the Data Availability Statement says the dataset is available only on request from the authors. No author code, images, or model checkpoints are publicly available.

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