abstract
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Carbon metabolism in plants is one of the key physio-biological processes to determining crop growth, yield and quality. It is very sensitive to abiotic stresses like drought and high temperature. The aim of present study was to investigate the independent and combined effects of drought and high temperature on carbohydrate metabolites (glucose, fructose and sucrose) and enzymes involved in carbohydrate metabolism (sucrose synthase and invertase) of wheat genotypes at anthesis and at 15 days after anthesis. This study was conducted with eight selected wheat genotypes viz., AKAW-3717, C-306, DHTW-60, HD-2967, HTW-11, Kundan, WH-730 and WH-1105. In control (irrigated) and drought-stressed experiments, genotypes were sown at optimum planting date, while for heat-stressed experiment sowing date was delayed. In timely sown condition WH-1105 followed by DHTW-60 had maximum sucrose synthase (SuSy) and invertase (INV) activity whereas, genotype DHTW-60 followed by HTW-11 was found to have maximum SuSy and INV activity under late and very late sown condition. Similar, result was found in case of water soluble carbohydrates. The finding form this study showed that wheat genotypes DHTW-60 and HTW-11 had higher activity of carbohydrate metabolism enzyme and high stem reserve mobilization. These genotypes may be exploited in future breeding programme in order to improve the physiological traits and seed yield under drought and high temperature condition.