The development of new lighting technologies such as light-emitting diodes (LEDs) can increase the capability to provide ideal light conditions to crops. This makes it possible to improve crop performance and product quality.
Each crop has a particular response to light quality. By providing a particular light spectrum to plants, plant growth, development and photomorphogenesis reactions can be controlled. Photomorphogenesis is a process by which plants produce phytochemicals in response to light signals. Phytochemicals present in vegetables have an impact on people’s health. The biosynthesis, metabolism and accumulation of phytochemicals can depend on light quality. This means providing a specific light spectrum to plants can control plant shape, growth and also have an impact on taste, aroma, chemical compounds, nutrition quality, etc.
Cannabis - Light quality and plant response
Red light: significantly increased yield, tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) (Hawley et al., 2018) and cannabidiol (CBD) (Magagnini et al., 2018) content in bud tissue.
Green light: significantly increased α-pinene, borneol (Hawley et al., 2018) and THC in bud tissue and antioxidant capacity compared to sunlight (Livadariu et al., 2018).
Blue light: increased polyphenols, flavonoids, fresh weight and protein compared to sunlight (Livadariu et al., 2018).