Factors Triggering Germination in Plasma-Activated Cotton Seeds: Water Imbibition Vs. Reactive Species’ Formation

Plasma technology has emerged as an efficient, simple, and eco-friendly method for activating seed germination processes. Most studies on this subject have focused on the morphological and wetting effects on the surface state of seeds and attributed the improvement in germination occasionally found to the induced hydrophilicity and a higher water imbibition rate. Recently, the involvement of reactive oxygen and nitrogen species in the germination process has also been highlighted. In this work, we study the effect of a very low-power cold atmospheric air-plasma treatment on the germination and sterilization of cotton seeds in normal (i.e., water abundant) and simulated drought conditions. Optical emission spectroscopy of the plasma has revealed the formation of different excited species of molecular nitrogen and oxygen, as well as OH and NO radicals that are deemed responsible for the chemical functionalization and slight morphological changes observed on the surfaces of cotton seeds. The physicochemical changes of the seed surface were analyzed by scanning electron microscopy, energy-dispersive x-ray spectroscopy, Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), and x-ray photoemission spectroscopy. This latter technique has shown the formation of a high surface concentration of oxygenated (i.e. –CO x , –C–OH, –O x ) and oxinitrided (i.e. –NO x ) functional groups which disappear from the surface upon exposure to vapor or liquid water. This process must entail the diffusion of these species (together with that of potassium ions that were plasma segregated to the surface) into the interior of seeds. The fact that the water uptake capacity of seeds is not significantly modified by the plasma treatment suggests that the observed in-diffusion of active oxygen and nitrogen species is an important factor in the enhancement of germination capacity induced by plasma activation, particularly under conditions of water scarcity, where germination differences of more than 60% could be found between pristine and plasma-treated seeds. The analysis by FT-IR of the adsorption of deuterated water (D2O) molecules is proposed as a useful procedure to directly monitor water uptake/release processes from seed surfaces.