Physiological mechanism of melatonin attenuating to osmotic stress tolerance in soybean seedlings

Frontiers in Plant Science

Plant Science

Xiu Ren Liang¹  Chang Jiang Zhao²  Jamal Nasar²  Xun Bo Zhou²  Mohammad Shah Jahan³  Dilfuza Jabborova⁴  Li Bo Shi⁵ 

[1] Guangxi Ecoengineering Vocational and Technical College, Liuzhou, China;Guangxi Key Laboratory of Agro-environment and Agro-products Safety, Key Laboratory of Crop Cultivation and Physiology, College of Agriculture, Guangxi University, Guangxi, Nanning, China;Guangxi Key Laboratory of Agro-environment and Agro-products Safety, Key Laboratory of Crop Cultivation and Physiology, College of Agriculture, Guangxi University, Guangxi, Nanning, China;Department of Horticulture, Faculty of Agriculture, Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University, Dhaka, Bangladesh;Laboratory of Medicinal Plants Genetics and Biotechnology, Institute of Genetics and Plant Experimental Biology, Academy of Sciences of Uzbekistan, Tashkent, Uzbekistan;MAP Division (Shandong) of Sinochem Agriculture Holdings, Jinan, China;

关键词: Aquaporins;    ABA metabolism;    soybean;    drought;    climate change;    water use efficiency;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpls.2023.1193666

 received in 2023-03-25, accepted in 2023-07-04,  发布年份 2023

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

Drought is one of the most significant abiotic stress threatening to crop production worldwide. Soybean is a major legume crop with immense economic significance, but its production is highly dependent on optimum rainfall or abundant irrigation. As the global climate changes, it is more important to find solutions to make plants more resilient to drought. The prime aimed of the study is to investigate the effect of melatonin on drought tolerance in soybean and its potential mechanisms. Soybean seedlings were treated with 20% polyethylene glycol 6000 (PEG 6000) and subjected to osmotic stress (14 days) with or without 100 μM melatonin treatment. Our results revealed that melatonin supplementation significantly mitigated PEG-induced growth retardation and increased water absorption ability. Foliar application of melatonin also increased gas exchange and the chlorophyll fluorescence attributes by the mitigation of the osmotic-induced reduction of the reaction activity of photosystems I and II, net photosynthetic rate (Pn), stomatal conductance (Gs), transpiration rate (Tr), electron transport activity, and photosynthetic efficiency. In addition, PEG-induced elevated production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and malondialdehyde (MDA) content were significantly reversed by melatonin treatment. Equally important, melatonin boosted the antioxidant activities of soybean plants. Moreover, osmotic stress substantially increased abscisic acid (ABA) accumulation in roots and leaves, while melatonin-received plant leaves accumulated less ABA but roots content higher ABA. Similarly, melatonin significantly suppressed ABA biosynthesis and signaling gene expression in soybean exposed to drought stress. Furthermore, osmotic stress significantly suppressed plasmalemma (GmPIPs) and tonoplast aquaporin (GmTIPs) genes expression, and their transcript abundance was up-regulated by melatonin co-addition. Taken together, our results indicated that melatonin potentially improves drought tolerance of soybean through the regulation of ABA and aquaporin gene expression, increasing photosynthetic efficiency as well as enhancing water uptake efficiency.

【 授权许可】

Unknown   
Copyright © 2023 Jahan, Zhao, Shi, Liang, Jabborova, Nasar and Zhou