Chloride at macronutrient levels increases drought resistance by improving water balance and water-use efficiency

Autor: Rosales Villegas, Miguel Á., Franco-Navarro, Juan D., Díaz-Rueda, P., Rivero, Carlos, Brumós Fuentes, Javier, Rubio Casal, A. E., Cires, A. de, Colmenero Flores, José M.
Rok vydání: 2019
Předmět:
Zdroj: Digital.CSIC. Repositorio Institucional del CSIC
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Popis: Póster presentado en el SEB’s Annual Meeting 2-5 July (2019) Seville, Spain
Chloride (Cl-) has been recently described as a beneficial macronutrient in well-irrigated plants, playing specific roles in promoting plant growth, photosynthetic performance and water-use efficiency (WUE). Therefore, a new research framework is opened in the search for adaptive mechanisms that regulate water homeostasis and, in particular, the plant ability to withstand water deficit. Drought is now recognized as the abiotic stress that most importantly affects global crop productivity. Understanding how plants use water for optimal biomass production has become a fundamental issue worldwide. In this work, we aim to elucidate whether Cl- nutrition at macronutrient levels stimulates drought resistance and which physiological mechanisms are involved. To that end, tobacco plants were treated for 30 days with three nutritional treatments added to the basal solution: CL (5 mM Cl-), N (5 mM nitrate), and SP (1.25 mM sulphate and 1.875 mM phosphate), containing all of them the same cationic balance. Then, plants were subjected to two irrigation regimes for 20 days: control (100% field capacity) and moderate drought (60% field capacity). Results showed that, in comparison to SP and N treatments, Cl- application (CL treatment) improved plant growth, leaf development, water balance parameters and WUE under drought conditions. Interestingly, N-treated plants exhibited the strongest growth reduction during drought, showing higher stress symptoms caused by an inefficient water use. Therefore, we propose that the abundant uptake and accumulation of Cl- responds to an adaptive function that improves water relations and drought resistance in higher plants.
Databáze: OpenAIRE
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