Abstract
Aims
The survival and ecological distribution of plants in arid habitats are mainly conditioned by water availability and physiological adaptations to withstand drought. In the present study, we have compared the physiological responses to drought of two Retama raetam (retama) subspecies from Tunisia, one of them living under the desert climate (subsp. raetam) and the other one growing on the coast (subsp. bovei).
Methods
To physiologically characterize the two R. raetam subspecies, and to elucidate their main mechanisms underlying their tolerance to drought stress, parameters related to seed germination, growth, photosynthesis (net photosynthetic rate, intracellular CO2 concentration, transpiration rate, stomatal conductance and water use efficiency), and accumulation of osmolytes (proline, glycine betaine and soluble sugars) were determined in four-month-old plants subjected to stress for up to one month.
Important findings
Drought significantly inhibited germination, growth, and all the evaluated photosynthetic parameters. Plants of R. raetam subsp. bovei were severely affected by drought after three weeks of treatment when photosynthesis rates were up to 7-fold lower than in the controls. At the same time, proline and glycine betaine significantly accumulated compared to the irrigated controls, but much less than in R. raetam subsp. raetam; in the latter subspecies, proline and glycine betaine increased to levels 24-fold and 6-fold higher, respectively, than in the corresponding controls. In summary, the population living in the desert region exhibited stronger tolerance to drought stress than that adapted to the semiarid littoral climate, suggesting that tolerance in R. raetam is dependent on accumulation of osmolytes.
Abscisic Acid and Glycine Betaine Mediated Tolerance Mechanisms under Drought Stress and Recovery in Axonopus compressus: A New Insight
