TY - JOUR AU - Abdull, Sherzad R. AU - Rashid, Sahar H. AU - Ghafoor, Bakhtiar S. AU - Khdhir, Barzan S. PY - 2022/09/21 Y2 - 2024/03/29 TI - Effect of Ag Nanoparticles on Morphological and Physio-biochemical Traits of the Medicinal Plant Stevia Rebaudiana JF - Caryologia JA - Caryologia VL - 75 IS - 2 SE - Articles DO - 10.36253/caryologia-1447 UR - https://riviste.fupress.net/index.php/caryologia/article/view/1447 SP - 15-22 AB - <p class="p1">Nowadays, overproduction of secondary metabolites in remedial herbs through giving biotic/abiotic stresses is an interesting area of research. In the current study, the influences of various concentrations of silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs) were evaluated on several morphological and physio-biochemical traits, such as the steviol glycosides level in <em>Stevia.</em> The findings showed that the herbs incubated with 400-ppm Ag NPs own the highest dry and fresh weight of shoot, while those incubated with 80- up to 200- ppm Ag NPs own the highest steviol glycosides content. As a result, we successfully improve the content of stevioside glycoside up to 1.75-fold by applying the 80- up to 200-ppm Ag NPs in <em>Stevia </em>medicinal plant. Moreover, our findings revealed that low concentrations the Ag NPs lead to an increase of glutathione content and total antioxidant capacity, and a decrease of MDA, whereas treatments at higher concentrations induced adverse effects for the plant. As a result, the treatment with Ag NPs low concentrations had a favorable efficacy on physio-biochemical and morphological characteristics of <em>Stevia.</em> These achievements are very promising, because they revealed a considerable capability for the Ag NPs application in enhancing the secondary metabolites in <em>Stevia</em> remedial herb. The present study is the first case assessing the desirable influences of Ag NPs on the Stevia, in regard with shifting of biosynthetic pathway of steviol glycosides in a concentration-dependent manner.</p> ER -