Potential Assessment of Selenium for Improving Yield and Nitrogen Use Efficiency in Garlic (Allium sativum L.)

In order to evaluate the effect of different levels of nitrogen and selenium on the yield and nitrogen utilization efficiency, a factorial experiment was conducted based on a randomized complete block design with three replications at Razi University. In this experiment, the first factor included different levels of nitrogen including 0, 50, 100 and 150 kg ha-1 and the second factor was selenium foliar spraying at three levels of 0, 5 and 10 mg L-1 of sodium selenate. Nitrogen, selenium and the interaction between two factors had a significant effect on the biological and economic yield of garlic. The interaction between nitrogen and selenium increased the harvest index of garlic. According to the obtained results, increasing the amount of nitrogen and selenium increased the yield and nitrogen utilization efficiency. The use of 150 kg ha-1 of nitrogen along with 10 mg L-1 of sodium selenate has caused garlic to have the highest nitrogen utilization efficiency in addition to its high ability to absorb nitrogen and produce maximum yield.