AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH COMMUNICATION CENTRE www.arccjournals.com LR-509 [1-6] *Corresponding author’s e-mail: bpasary@yahoo.com Department of Agronomy and Plant Breeding, Sanandaj branch, Islamic Azad University, Sanandaj, Iran. Legume Research, Print ISSN:0250-5371 / Online ISSN:0976-0571 Study the Effect of Mycorrizal Fungi¸Chitosan and Cycocel on Agronomic Characteristics of Rainfed Chickpea M.A. Rezaie, B. Pasari*, Kh. Mohammadi, A. Rokhzadi and E. Karami Department of Agronomy and Plant Breeding, Sanandaj branch, Islamic Azad University, Sanandaj, Iran. Received: 18-06-2019 Accepted: 26-09-2019 DOI: 10.18805/LR-509 ABSTRACT This experiment was conducted as split-split plot in a randomized complete block design in two consecutive years (2016- 2017) in rainfed conditions of Iran. The main plot consisted of mycorrhiza inoculations (uninoculation: control and inoculation) by Glomus intraradices and sub plot involved chitosan application (0, 0.5 and 1gr/lit) and sub-subplots were foliar application of cycocel (0, 0.5 and 1 gr/lit). The results showed that the number of infertile pods was influenced by chitosan, cycocel, interactions of mycorrhiza × cycocel and chitosan × cycocel in the first year. Also in the first year, the number of fertilized pods and seed yield was also affected by the interaction of mycorrhiza × cycocel and increased by mycorrhiza × cyocel (1gr/l) compared to the control by 23.35 and 24.05%, respectively. The protein percentage in the second year was also significantly affected by the interaction of chitosan × cycocel. Key words: Chickpea, Chitosan, Cycocel, Mycorrhizal fungi, Protein. INTRODUCTION Under semi-arid condition of Iran, where the farmers have reached 53% of chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) potential yield (Soltani et al. 2016), alleviating or compensating the adverse and negative effect of drought stress that takes place on the reproductive growth stage of rainfed legume, is very important (Janmohammadi et al. 2014). In order to improve drought resistance and enhance water use efficiency of plant, closure or reduce the size of stomata openings introduced by Zeng and Luo (2012). Among different anti-transpiration compounds, Chitosan is biodegradable and sub-product of the marine industry that introduced as a plant growth bio-stimulant and lowering agent of drought effect (Janmohammadi et al. 2014). The antitranspirant effect of chitosan and consequently decreasing water needed for plant reported by some researchers. Bitelli et al. (2001) was found that chitosan could closure of the plant’s stomata, following that decrease water consumption by 26-43% without reduction in biomass. Also, increasing growth under water deficit conditions by chitosan was found by Mahdavi et al. (2011) and Abu-Muriefah (2013). Improvement of root system, leaf water content of seedlings and boosting the capability of water absorption by chitosan were found by Zeng and Luo (2012). Another way to overcome the harmful effects of water deficit in plants has been announced by application of growth retarding chemicals, including Cycocel. Cycocel were pointed to prevent the excessive vegetative growth (Bhattarai 2017; Koutroubas et al. 2014) and improving more translocation of photo-assimilates, results in increasing the yield component (Bhattarai 2017), increasing seed yield (Kumari 2017; Koutroubas et al. 2014; Sarkar et al. 2006) and protein content (Bora and Sarma 2006). In order to improve the absorption and use of water available in water shortage conditions, the use of Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi as a promising option has been introduced. Mycorrhizal inoculation is known as the coexistence of fungi and root plant (Temegne et al. 2018) which has a lot of favorable effects for the coexistence plant, such as: increasing availability and absorption of nutrients from the soils (Njeru et al. 2014), resistant to drought condition due to enhancing water uptake (Eulenstein et al. 2017) and finally enhance crop yield (Hazzoumi et al. 2017; Eulenstein et al. 2017). Keeping this view, we assumed that increasing the seed yield of chickpea in dry conditions could take place by increasing the absorption of water and nutrient by mycorrhizal inoculations, along with decreasing water loss by reducing the transpiration caused by chitosan, and ultimately reducing vegetative growth and enhancing reproductive growth of the chickpea plant by cycocel. MATERIALS AND METHODS This experiment was conducted as split-split plot in a randomized complete block design at Kamyaran in northwest of Iran (34°47 16 N and 46°53 41 E and 1425 m above sea level) during two consecutive years (2016-2017) in rainfed conditions.