Yield and yield formation of field winter wheat in response to supplemental solar ultraviolet-B radiation

The stratospheric ozone decrease has heightened concern over the ecological implications of increasing solar UV-B radiation on agricultural production and natural plant ecosystems. UV-B is absorbed, and can damage many important plant species through a variety of interacting mechanisms. The effects of enhanced UV-B exposure on yield and yield formation of winter wheat associated with photo synthetic activity and total biomass development were investigated in this study. The overall experimental design included three UV-B treatments (two supplemental UV-B treatments and an ambient level) with three replicates of each treatment. Results suggested that the supplemental UV-B can cause the decrease of yield of winter wheat up to 24% with 11.4% increased UV-B. Supplemental UVB decreased dry matter accumulation most during the jointing-booting stage when the leaf area index (LAI) was the greatest. In addition, the supplemental U-VB appeared to effect the distribution of dry matter but did not effect the net assimilation ratio of the wheat.