The effect of artificial light quality on growth and nutritional value of broccoli microgreens (Brassica oleracea var. italica)

Subject Areas : Medicinal Plants

Mohaddese Moghimi Kandelousi ¹ , Hossein Moradi ² , Kamran Ghasemi ³ , Seyed Hamidreza Hashemi Patroodi ⁴

1 - Department of Horticultural Sciences and Engineering, Faculty of Agricultural Sciences, Sari University of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, Sari, Iran.
2 - Department of Horticultural Sciences, University of Agriculture and Natural Resources of Sari, Sari,Iran
3 - Department of Horticultural Sciences and Engineering, Faculty of Agricultural Sciences, Sari University of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, Sari, Iran
4 - Research Institute of Genetics and Biotechnology, Tabaristan, Sari, Sari, Iran

Received: 2022-07-25 Accepted : 2024-12-17 Published : 2025-03-21

Keywords: Antioxidant, Flavonoid, Phenol, Photosynthetic pigments, Plant factory,

Abstract :

Microgreens are defined as plants that harvest and consume in the first stages of true leaf growth when the cotyledon leaves are fully expanded. The increasing emphasis on improving the health level of the society has caused the products with high nutritional value and functional food to be considered very important. And in the future, nutritional agricultural products can find a special place in the food basket of the society. Therefore, in this research, the effect of the light spectrum and sulfur element nutrition for the production of sulfur-friendly microgreens such as broccoli has been studied in order to achieve a suitable combination treatment to increase both yield and nutritional value.  This experiment was conducted as a factorial in the form of a completely randomized design with two factors and four replications under artificial light. The first factor, i.e. light spectrum, was investigated at four levels and the second factor, nutrition, harvest time at two levels (10 and 14 days). The light treatments included different ratios of red (R) and blue (B) light (R1B2, R1B1, R2B1, R3B1). The evaluated traits included morphological traits, biomass, photosynthetic pigments, total antioxidant, total phenol and total flavonoid. Statistical analysis of data was done using SAS 9.1 software and comparison of averages . The lowest amount of dry weight produced was obtained in R1B2 treatment, which was not significantly different from R1B1, but it was significantly lower than R2B1 and R3B1 treatments. Although the light quality did not affect the length of the cotyledon leaf, it had a significant effect on the width of the cotyledon leaf; So that the lowest cotyledon leaf width was seen in the R1B2 treatment, which was significantly less than the other three light treatments. R1B2 treatment produced the lowest stem length, the difference with R1B1 was not significant, but it was significantly lower than the two treatments R2B1 and R3B1, which had dominant red light. The highest amount of chlorophyll b was obtained in R2B1 light treatment and harvesting on the 10th day, but in other light ratios where the amount of red light was increased or decreased, the amount of chlorophyll b also decreased. In chlorophyll a and total chlorophyll, which were only affected by the time of harvest, the amount of these two indicators was significantly higher on the 10th day than on the 14th day. Investigating the effect of light quality on the amount of carotenoids showed that R1B2 treatment, where the amount of blue light was predominant, the amount of this pigment was significantly lower than other light treatments. The lowest amount of total antioxidant activity was observed in the 10th day harvest and in R1B2 light treatment, which was significantly lower than all other treatments. The amount of total phenol in R2B1 light treatment with dominant red light and harvested on the 10th day was significantly higher than other treatments. The simple effect of harvesting time on the amount of total flavonoids was significant and its amount was significantly higher on the seventh day than on the tenth day. Overall, the results show that LED light with red light spectrum has a better effect on some traits, so different light combinations can be used depending on the producer's goal.

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