Li 3100

Five plants from the middle rows of each pilot module were randomly selected to calculate green leaf number (GLN), flag leaf area (FLA), and green leaf area (GLA) at the mid anthesis stage. All green leaves were removed from the five plants and run through an area meter (LI 3100; LI-COR Inc., Lincoln, NE, USA) to calculate surface GLA. Thereafter, all parts of the five plants (stem, green and complete brown leaves, sheath parts and spike) were oven-dried at 70 °C for 72 h to a constant weight and then weighed to obtain dry stem weight (DSW), dry leaf weight (DLW), and total dry weight (TDW). Data taken from GLA (A), number of plants in 1 m (B), number of plants used (C = 5, in this study), and distance between rows (D = 17 cm, in this study) were used to calculate leaf area index (LAI), according to this equation [5 (link)]:

The shoot growth and developmental parameters, including plant height (PH), tiller number (TN), and leaf number (LN), were measured one day before the final harvest (36 DAS) for all 74 rice genotypes. The leaf area was measured using the leaf-area meter (LI-3100: Li-COR, Lincoln, NE, USA) on the day of harvest before leaf rolling. The leaves and stems were then stored separately in the oven at 75 °C for 5 consecutive days. Other plant components, including leaf dry weight (LDW), stem dry weight (SDW), shoot dry weight (SHDW), and the total dry weights (TDW) of all plants, were measured after a constant dry weight was attained. The growth and developmental parameters were calculated for drought and irrigated conditions for morpho-physiological and genotypic variability comparison among the genotypes.

At the end of each experiment, ten plants per treatment were harvested destructively. Each plant was split into plant organs already present at the start of the experiment and newly formed plant organs. A leaf larger than 2 cm in length was counted as a leaf. Internode length was measured between leaf 4 and 5. Leaf area was determined with a leaf area meter (LI-3100, LI-COR, Lincoln, Nebraska, NE, United States). Fresh and dry weights of all plant organs were determined. Dry weights were measured after drying leaves and stems for at least 48 h at 70°C. Dry matter content was calculated by dividing total dry weight by total fresh weight. The specific leaf area of leaf 6 was calculated by dividing its leaf area by its leaf dry mass.

After application, the number of leaves and plant height were evaluated at 7, 14, 21, 28, 35, and 42 days after application (DAA), and at 42 DAA, leaf area and leaf, stem, and total dry mass were evaluated, and the level of injury caused by glyphosate was assessed by visual analysis as a percentage from 0 to 100, where 0 represents the absence of symptoms and 100% represents plant death (SBCPD, 1995). The attribution of grades of injury caused by the application of glyphosate was according to the appearance of symptoms (chlorosis, leaf narrowing, reduction and paralysis of growth and death of the apical meristem). In each experimental repetition, the evaluations were made in five plants for each dose of glyphosate.
The plant height was determined from the stem to the apex, and the leaf area was obtained using a leaf area integrator (LI-3100, Li-Cor Inc., Lincoln, NE, USA). For the determination of dry matter, the samples were placed in a forced air oven at 60 °C for 72 h and then weighed on a precision analytical balance (0.0001 g).

The cumulative yield of basil is expressed as g m⁻² for four harvests. At the same time, the number of leaves per plant was recorded. Afterwards, the leaf area was determined by leaf area meter (Li-3100, LICOR, Lincoln, NE, USA) and indicated as cm² plant⁻¹.

After 21 days from transplanting, a final destructive harvest was carried out. Each experimental plant was carefully cleaned to remove any remaining river sand from the roots. Excess water was wiped clean with tissue paper, and the plant height was measured immediately, after which the plant was separated into roots, stem, and leaves. Total leaf area was measured using an area meter (LI-3100, Li-Cor Biosciences, Lincoln, NE, United States). Leaves, stems, and roots were dried in a ventilated oven for 72 h at 105°C to obtain the dry mass. For each genotype, the initial dry mass at transplanting was measured using seedlings of each genotype germinated in the same conditions as the experimental plants.

Major environmental parameters were measured continuously at the field site, including air temperature (T_air), soil temperature (T_soil) at 0.05 m depth (TCAV thermocouple, Campbell Scientific, Logan, UT, USA), volumetric soil water content (SWC) (ML2x, Delta-T Devices, Cambridge, UK), soil heat flux (SHF) quantified by means of heat flux plates (three replicates at 0.05 m depth, corrected for the change in heat storage above that depth; HFP01, Hukseflux, Delft, the Netherlands), total photosynthetically active radiation (PAR) (BF3H, Delta-T, Cambridge, UK) and precipitation (52202, R. M. Young, Traverse City, MI, USA). All data were collected continuously by a data logger (CR10X, Campbell Scientific, Logan, UT, USA). The green plant area index (GAI) was assessed (i) in a destructive fashion by harvesting the plant matter of square plots (0.09 m², 3–5 replicates) and subsequent plant area determination (Li-3100, LiCor, Lincoln, NE, USA) and (ii) from measurements of canopy height which were related to destructively measured GAI (Wohlfahrt et al., 2008b ). Continuous time series of the GAI were derived by fitting appropriate empirical functions to measured data separately for each growing phase before and after cutting events. A more detailed list of all auxiliary parameters measured at this site is given by Wohlfahrt et al. (2008b) and Hammerle et al. (2008) .