Peran Nano Kitosan Terhadap Pertumbuhan Bulbil Porang (Amorphophallus Oncophyllus Prain.) pada Kondisi Cekaman Kekeringan

Abstract

Elephant Foot Yam is a type of tuber plant that belongs to the Araceae (taro) family. An effort to minimize the impact of drought stress on Elephant Foot Yam plants is the provision of nano chitosan. This research aims to determine the role of nano chitosan in increasing the growth and production of Elephant Foot Yam plants under drought stress conditions. This research was carried out in the greenhouse of the Faculty of Agriculture, University of North Sumatra, Medan at an altitude of ± 32 meters above sea level from September 2023 to January 2024. This research used a Randomized Block Design with 2 treatment factors. The first factor is the level of drought stress (percentage of soil water content) which consists of 3 levels, namely providing water at 80% of field capacity, 60% of field capacity and 40% of field capacity. The second factor is the administration of nano chitosan which consists of 4 levels, namely without giving nano chitosan, concentrations of 45 ppm, 90 ppm and 135 ppm. The research results showed that drought stress treatment had a significant effect on leaf emergence age, plant height 6-14 MST, stem diameter 6-14 MST, number of leaves 7 MST, bulbil emergence age, tuber weight and tuber diameter. The treatment of giving nano chitosan had a significant effect on increasing the growth of leaf exit age, plant height 5-14 MST, stem diameter 6-14 MST, number of leaves 6-7 MST, age of bulbil exit, number of bulbils, tuber weight and tuber diameter. The treatment interaction of giving nano chitosan in drought stress conditions had a significant effect on increasing stem diameter at 7-9 MST in combination with 80% field capacity with giving nano chitosan at a concentration of 90 ppm.