Seed Priming and Metal/Metalloid Stress Tolerance in Plants

Metal contamination, as a consequence of anthropogenic activities, poses threat to plants and their ecosystems. Plants growing on metal-contaminated soils show severe aberration in their metabolism leading to stunted plant growth and low biomass production. Recently, seed priming has enabled us to improve germination and yield on such heavy metals toxic soils by different mechanisms. Seed priming is conferring tolerance against abiotic besides biotic stresses. Different seed priming procedures like hydropriming, chemo-priming, osmopriming, redox priming, nutrio-priming, hormo-priming, and biopriming are being used under metal/metalloid stress conditions. Priming of seeds is generally done with natural or synthetic compounds before sowing of seeds. It is the simplest, easiest, and cost-effective technique for improving seed vigor and robust seedling emergence ultimately adding increments to the economy of country with high returns. Seed priming treatment effectively alleviates the negative impact of metal stress through different mechanisms. In this chapter seed priming is discussed in context of their potential for alleviation of different metal stresses. Furthermore, different mechanisms of seed priming are elaborated.