Impacts of Magnetic Field Treatment on Water Quality for Irrigation, Soil Properties and Maize Yield.

Hamza, Ahmad Hussam; Shreif, M.; Abd El-Azeim, Mohieddin Mohamad; Mohamed, Wael Abdelmoez

doi:10.21608/jmr.2020.44778.1053

Impacts of Magnetic Field Treatment on Water Quality for Irrigation, Soil Properties and Maize Yield.

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Soil sciences, faculty of agriculture, Minia university, Minia, Egypt

² Soil Sciences, faculty of agriculture, minia university, minia, Egypt

³ soil and water science department Faculty of Agriculture, Minia University, Minia Egypt

⁴ Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Minia University, Egypt

10.21608/jmr.2020.44778.1053

Abstract

Application of magnetic treatment technology for saline irrigation water in agriculture is very limited. Therefore, field experiment was conducted to investigate the influence of magnetic field treatment on the quality of saline groundwater for irrigation and in turn impacts of irrigation by magnetized water on sandy soil properties and maize production under desert conditions in Sinai, Egypt. Magnetic field treatment of irrigation water caused leaching salts below root zones, reduced sodium and chloride accumulation, decreased Na/Cl ratio from 1.01 to 0.89 which mitigated the negative impacts on maize plants in the root zone. Results showed high significant decreases in soil salinity (EC, and SAR) and levels of soil soluble cations and anions in the root zone of soils irrigated with magnetically treated saline water compared to control. Also, sandy soil irrigated with magnetized water had a higher moisture content, available water and soil field capacity compared to control. Irrigation with unmagnetized water induced wetted soil volume of 2575.68 cm3 reflecting low drip irrigation application efficiency of 64.07 %, while wetted soil volume was 2919.24 cm3 reflecting high water application efficiency of 72.62% for irrigation with magnetized water. Results of this research demonstrated significant beneficial effects of magnetic field treatment on saline water quality, sandy soil properties and maize crop yield confirming the possibility of using low quality water for irrigation under water scarcity and arid conditions.

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