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Physiological responses of watercress to brackish waters and different nutrient solution circulation times

Water scarcity and the use of brackish water are the main challenges for agricultural development. In view of this, the present study proposes to examine physiological responses of the broadleaf-cress crop in an NFT hydroponics system according to the use of brackish water and nutrient solution circulation times. The treatments were distributed in a randomized block design with five water salinity levels (ECw: 0.6, 1.6, 2.6, 3.6 and 4.6 dS m-1) and two nutrient solution circulation times (T1 = 10 min and T2 = 15 min), totaling 10 treatments with four replicates, which resulted in 40 experimental plots. The following variables were analyzed: net photosynthetic rate, stomatal conductance, transpiration, leaf proline content, shoot moisture content, stem diameter and root length. The maximum observed photosynthetic rates were 20.9 mmol m-2 s-1 (T1) and 20.0 mmol m-2 s-1 (T2). Maximum stomatal conductance was 0.44 mol m-2 s-1, which decreased by 63.4% at the highest salinity level. The increasing ECw levels in both growing cycles evaluated reduced gas exchanges, stem diameter and root length. The nutrient solution circulation time of 15 min provided the most satisfactory results for the analyzed variables.