Enantioselectivity and allelopathy both have effects on the inhibition of napropamide on Echinochloa crus-galli

Napropamide is a chiral acetamide herbicide commonly applied to control Echinochloa crus-galli in maize. The inhibition effect may be enantioselective for Echinochloa crus-galli and maize. It may also be affected by the potential allelopathy at field condition. To investigate this, we have examined the inhibition effect of napropamide on Echinochloa crus-galli mono-cultured or co-cultured with maize at field conditions. Our results on morphology, physiology, chlorophyll content and chlorophyll fluorescence suggest that R-napropamide has stronger inhibitory effect than Rac-napropamide and S-napropamide on Echinochloa crus-galli, while none of them affects maize. We found that both glutathione-S-transferase (GST) genes and oxidative enzymes (superoxide dismutase, malondialdehyde) played roles in the inhibition. Accumulations of napropamide in Echinochloa crus-galli were more prominent in roots than in shoots, and no enantioselectivity was found in medium dissipation. We have observed relative allelopathy when applying napropamide to Echinochloa crus-galli co-cultured with maize. The results warrant further field studies on the enantioselectivity and allelopathy of herbicides.