Direct and Quick Monitoring of Water Potential in Dry Soil

CSA News ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 58 (1) ◽  
pp. 13-13
Keyword(s):  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jing Yan ◽  
Nathaniel A. Bogie ◽  
Teamrat Ghezzehei

Abstract. Most plants derive their water and nutrient needs from soils, where the resources are often scarce, patchy, and ephemeral. In natural environments, it is not uncommon for plant roots to encounter mismatched patches of water-rich and nutrient-rich regions. Such an uneven distribution of resources necessitates plants to rely on strategies that allow them to explore and acquire nutrients from relatively dry patches. We conducted a laboratory study to provide a mechanistic understanding of the biophysical factors that enable this adaptation. We grew plants in split-root pots that permitted precisely controlled spatial distributions of resources. The results demonstrated that spatial mismatch of water and nutrient availability does not cost plant productivity compared to matched distributions. Specifically, we showed that nutrient uptake is not reduced by overall soil dryness, provided that the whole plant has access to sufficient water elsewhere in the root zone. Essential strategies include extensive root proliferation towards nutrient-rich dry soil patches that allows rapid nutrient capture from brief pulses. Using high-frequency water potential measurements, we also observed nocturnal water release by roots that inhabit dry and nutrient-rich soil patches. Soil water potential gradient is the primary driver of this transfer of water from wet to dry soil parts of the root zone, which is commonly known as hydraulic redistribution (HR). The occurrence of HR prevents the soil drying from approaching the permanent wilting point, and thus supports root functions and enhance nutrient availability. Our results indicate that roots facilitate HR by increasing root-hair density and length and deposition of organic coatings that alter water retention. Therefore, we conclude that biologically-controlled root adaptation involves multiple strategies that compensate for nutrient acquisition under mismatched resource distributions. Based on our findings, we proposed a nature-inspired nutrient management strategy for significantly curtailing water pollution from intensive agricultural systems.


1993 ◽  
Vol 20 (5) ◽  
pp. 425 ◽  
Author(s):  
R Munns ◽  
RE Sharp

Hormones appear to be important in controlling plant growth in soils of low water potential, particularly in changing the root:shoot ratio as the soil dries or becomes saline, and in communicating soil conditions to the leaves. This review has necessarily focused on abscisic acid (ABA), as there is little information about the role of other hormones in controlling growth in dry or saline soils. ABA is partly responsible for the differential response of root and shoot growth to dry soils. In dry soil it maintains root growth and inhibits shoot growth. However, when applied to well-watered plants, it usually inhibits root and shoot growth, showing that plants in dry soil respond quite differently from well-watered plants. ABA affects the rate of cell expansion in plants in dry soils: it maintains cell expansion in roots and inhibits that in leaves. It may also affect the rate of cell production, but little is known about this. The role of ABA as a long-distance signal in controlling growth by root-to-shoot communication is unclear: the concentrations found in xylem sap can affect stomatal conductance, but seem too low to affect leaf expansion. Yet drought and salinity generally affect leaf expansion before they affect leaf conductance. A possible solution to this puzzle is that ABA is transported in xylem sap in a complexed form, or that another compound in xylem sap stimulates the synthesis or activity of ABA in leaves, or affects leaf expansion independently of ABA.


2014 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Song Ai Nio ◽  
Audry Agatha Lenak

Abstrak Penggulungan daun merupakan salah satu bentuk resistensi terhadap kekeringan atau lebih tepatnya mekanisme menghindari kekeringan pada tumbuhan monokotil. Mekanisme ini terjadi dengan cara menurunkan laju evapotranspirasi atau dengan meningkatkan absorpsi air pada tanah kering untuk mempertahankan potensial air daun tetap tinggi. Proses penggulungan daun ini berkaitan erat dengan peranan sel kipas. Pada saat kekurangan air, jumlah dan ukuran sel kipas meningkat, sehingga daun akan menggulung. Tingkat penggulungan daun dapat ditentukan secara visual berdasarkan sistem standar evaluasi untuk tanaman padi dengan memberi skor 1-9. Rendahnya tingkat penggulungan daun berkorelasi positif dengan meningkatnya potensial air daun. Kata kunci: menghindari kekeringan, penggulungan daun Abstract Leaf rolling is one mechanism of drought resistance, i.e. drought avoidance. This mechanism was resulted from decreasing evapotranspiration rate or increasing water absorption in the dry soil to maintain high leaf water potential. The process of leaf rolling in monocotyledon was closely related to the activity of bulliform cells. The number and size of bulliform cells were increased under water deficit, so that leaf rolling occurred. Leaf rolling score (1-9) could be visually determined based on the system of standard evaluation in rice. The low leaf rolling score was positively correlated with high leaf water potential. Keywords: drought avoidance, leaf rolling


1987 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 119-126 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas L. Kieft ◽  
Edith soroker ◽  
Mary K. firestone

2014 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 20-24
Author(s):  
Gader Ghaffari ◽  
Farhad Baghbani ◽  
Behnam Tahmasebpour

In order to group winter rapeseed cultivars according to evaluated traits, an experiment was conducted in the Research Greenhouse of Agriculture Faculty, University of Tabriz - IRAN. In the experiment were included 12 cultivars of winter rapeseed and 3 levels of water deficit stress. Gypsum blocks were used to monitor soil moisture. Water deficit stress was imposed from stem elongation to physiological maturity. According to the principal component analysis, five principal components were chosen with greater eigenvalue (more than 0.7) that are including 81.34% of the primeval variance of variables. The first component that explained the 48.02% of total variance had the high eigenvalue. The second component could justify about 13.64% of total variance and had positive association with leaf water potential and proline content and had negative relationship with leaf stomatal conductivity. The third, fourth and fifth components expressed around, 10.18, 4.83 and 4.68% of the total variance respectively. The third component had the high eigenvalue for plant dry weight. The fourth component put 1000-seed weight, seed yield, Silique per Plant and root dry weight against plant dry weight, chlorophyll fluorescence and leaf water potential. The fifth component had the high eigenvalue for root dry weight, root volume and 1000-seed weight.


Author(s):  
L. I. Goncharova ◽  
P. N. Tsygvintsev ◽  
О. А. Guseva

The effect of increased UV-A radiation during the ontogeny of barley plants of the Vladimir variety in the vegetation experiment was studied. Changes in the content of malonic dialdehyde, flavonoids and grain yield were revealed. UV-A radiation as compared to UV-B radiation, has lower quantum energy and can have both positive and negative effects on plant regulatory and photosynthetic processes. One of the most damaging effects of increased levels of UV-A radiation is oxidative stress, which causes lipid peroxidation of biological membranes. The existence of a plant cell in such conditions is possible only thanks to a system of antioxidant defense mechanisms. The accumulation of phenolic compounds under the action of UV radiation is a universal mechanism of protection against photodamage, which was formed in the early stages of the evolution of photoautotrophic organisms. Flavonoids are localized in the epidermis of plant tissues and act as an internal filter. The content of flavonoids is determined by the genotype and due to ontogenetic patterns. Plants were grown in a greenhouse, in vessels containing 4.5 kg of air-dry soil. The repetition is threefold (3 vessels in each variant). Sowing density - 13 plants in each vessel. As a source of UV-A radiation used lamps Black Light BLUE company Philips. Plants were irradiated for 5 hours a day from 10 to 15 hours at 13, 25, 34, 43 and 52 stages of organogenesis. The magnitude of the daily biologically effective dose of UV-A radiation was 60.7 kJ / m2. The solar part of the UV spectrum in the vegetation experiment was absent in the greenhouse. The nature of changes in the content of flavonoids under the action of UV-A irradiation during the growing season of plants with the dynamics of the oxidative process has been established. The first maximum was observed during the vegetative growth period, the second - at the earing stage. The data obtained indicate that flavonoids have ontogenetic conditionality and perform photoprotective functions. The increase in their content under the action of UV-A radiation is accompanied by an increase in resistance to photodamage, which is confirmed by the formation of grain yield.


The article presents the results of a vegetation experiment on studying an effect of increasing doses of nitrogen (factor С - N0; No.o5; No.io; N015; No.2o; N0,25 g/kg of absolutely dry soil) and pre-sowing inoculation of seeds with biological preparation "Risotorphine" (factor В - no inoculation; by inoculation) on the formation of vegetative mass and grain yield ofpeas at cultivating in the conditions of a poorly cultivated (factor A0) and of a medium cultivated (factor A f sod-podzolic soil. Cultivation degree of soil was expressed by such criteria as power of an arable horizon, value of metabolic acidity and content of mobile phosphorus, a degree of saturation of soil with bases. For experience tab there were used Mitscher-lich cups with a capacity of 5 kg of absolutely dry soil (a.d.s.), in 16 repetitions of options. The experiments were conducted in the conditions of vegetation site on the territory of University Scientific Centre "Lipogorie" of FSBEI Perm GATA, guided by a science-based methodology. When harvesting peas for a green mass more intensive development and productivity of plants (23.3 and 58.9, 40.0, 78.8 g/cup, respectively) in the phase of stem branching and budding a beginning offlowering that is recorded for its use on the background of inoculation, usage of mineral nitrogen in a dose of 0.10 g/kg on a poorly cultivated soil and 0.15 g/kg a.d.s. on a medium cultivated soil. Applying of higher doses of nitrogen has a depressing effect on development of assimilating surface of pea plants on a poorly and a medium cultivated soil. When raising pea plants before harvest maturity of grain: in the conditions of a poorly cultivated soil for yield at the level of 7.92 g/cup, the process of carrying on only an inoculation of seed with microbial preparation "Rizotorfin" can be considered; in the medium cultivated soil varieties, plant peas impose higher requirements for the level of mineral nutrition the maximum yield in the experiment (which 9.22 g/cup), noted at a combined use of inoculation and mineral nitrogen in a dose of 0.20 g/kg a.d.s.


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