STUDY ON SEED STORAGE TECHNIQUE AND LONGEVITY IN HYBRID RICE

Studies on the longevity of the seeds of three rice lines and their F1 hybrids with different moisture contents were conducted. This study found that: the safe moisture contents of male sterile lines and F1hybrids had decreased by 2% as compared with 13% for the maintainer lines and restorer lines, which is the upper limit of national standard moisture content for conventional rice varieties; The seed moisture content of the male sterile line and F1 hybrids is just about 11%, and the variation in longevity tends to show a typical contra-S - shaped survival curve. As the sprouting rate decreased to 80% the survival curve descended rapidly. According to the rules of the typical survival curve, we can set up several new equations to predict seed longvity.