Phytotoxicity of chitosan-based agronanofungicides in the vegetative growth of oil palm seedling.

Abstract

Although fungicides could be the best solution in combating fungal infections in crops, however, the phytotoxic level of fungicides to the crops should be tested first to ensure that it is safe for the crops. Moreover, nanocarrier systems of fungicides could play a significant role in the advancement of crop protection. For this reason, chitosan was chosen in the present study as a nanocarrier for fungicides of hexaconazole and/or dazomet in the development of a new generation of agronanofungicides with a high antifungal potent agent and no phytotoxic effect. Hence, the encapsulation of fungicides into the non-toxic biopolymer, chitosan was aims to reduce the phytotoxic level of fungicides. In the present study, the in vivo phytotoxicity of chitosan-fungicides nanoparticles on the physiological and vegetative growth of oil palm seedlings was evaluated in comparison to its pure fungicides as well as the conventional fungicides. The results revealed the formation of chitosan-fungicides nanoparticles could reduce the phytotoxic effect on oil palm seedlings compared to their counterparts, pure fungicides. The chitosan-fungicides nanoparticles were seen to greatly reduce the phytotoxic effect compared to the conventional fungicides with the same active ingredient.