Response of wheat to drought stress: focus on root and shoot nutrients, as well as leaf chlorophyll and glycine betaine

Drought stress is one of the limiting factors for plant growth. To evaluate the effect of drought stress (0, 150, 250 g/L of Polyethylene glycol 6000 (PEG)) on the physiological characteristics of two wheat cultivars (‘Gonbad’ and ‘N8720’), a hydroponic experiment was conducted. A factorial experiment was used and arranged in a completely randomized design with three replications at the Pasteur Institute of Iran (North Research Center). The experimental results showed that the main effect of cultivars was significant for all studied traits except nitrogen and phosphorus in the stems (p ≤ 0.01). The main effect of drought stress, as well as the interaction effect of drought stress and cultivars were significant for all studied traits (p ≤ 0.01). The highest content of elements in root and shoot and the chlorophyll content was observed in N8720 cultivar under control treatment. Moreover, in N8720 cultivar, the amount of glycine betaine increased due to drought stress, reaching its maximum at 250 g/L PEG. The results of correlation analysis showed that there is a positive and significant correlation between all traits (p ≤ 0.01). The result of experiment showed that N8720 cultivar exhibited superior characteristics in terms of all studied traits.