The response to water stress of the antioxidant system in maize seedling roots with different drought resistance

The level of lipid peroxidation and changes of activited oxygen scavenging system in two maize species with different drought resistance were studied.The results showed the activities of POD?CAT?APX?GR were obviously increased under light water stress,while decreased under middle and severe water stress,but the sensitive degree of these enzymes to water stress is different,the activity of SOD is still increased under middle water stress.The change of GSH content is similar to enzyme's,while the content AsA is declined constantly;the content of MDA is increased following the stronger water stress.The drought-resistn at variety Luyu No.14 has higher activity of enzymes,content of antioxidents and lower content of MDA than the drought-sensitive variety Yedan No.13.The differences of enzyme activities (except POD activity) and antioxiwdant contents between two species are very significance.This results that drought-resistant variety with stronger ability of antioxidant may be one of the important reasons of its higher tolerance.