Sugar infusion into trees: A novel method to study tree carbon relations and its regulations

Frontiers in Plant Science

Plant Science

Yue Yang¹  Mai-He Li²  Matthias Saurer³  Marco M. Lehmann³  Marcus Schaub³  Andreas Rigling⁴  Arthur Gessler⁴  Yan-Li Zhang⁴  Marco Walser⁵  Noureddine Hajjar⁵  Daniel Christen⁵  Beat Stierli⁵ 

[1] College of Ecology and Environment, Hainan University, Haikou, China;Forest Dynamics, Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL, Birmensdorf, Switzerland;College of Ecology and Environment, Hainan University, Haikou, China;Key Laboratory of Geographical Processes and Ecological Security in Changbai Mountains, Ministry of Education, School of Geographical Sciences, Northeast Normal University, Changchun, Jilin, China;College of Life Science, Hebei University, Baoding, Hebei, China;Forest Dynamics, Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL, Birmensdorf, Switzerland;Forest Dynamics, Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL, Birmensdorf, Switzerland;Department of Environmental Systems Science, Institute of Terrestrial Ecosystems, ETH Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland;Forest Soils and Biogeochemistry, Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL, Birmensdorf, Switzerland;

关键词: C-labelled glucose;    exogenous sugars;    carbon limitation;    carbon physiology;    methodology;    tree infusion;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpls.2023.1142595

 received in 2023-01-11, accepted in 2023-02-14,  发布年份 2023

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

Many carbon-related physiological questions in plants such as carbon (C) limitation or starvation have not yet been resolved thoroughly due to the lack of suitable experimental methodology. As a first step towards resolving these problems, we conducted infusion experiments with bonsai trees (Ficus microcarpa) and young maple trees (Acer pseudoplatanus) in greenhouse, and with adult Scots pine trees (Pinus sylvestris) in the field, that were “fed” with 13C-labelled glucose either through the phloem or the xylem. We then traced the 13C-signal in plant organic matter and respiration to test whether trees can take up and metabolize exogenous sugars infused. Ten weeks after infusion started, xylem but not phloem infusion significantly increased the δ13C values in both aboveground and belowground tissues of the bonsai trees in the greenhouse, whereas xylem infusion significantly increased xylem δ13C values and phloem infusion significantly increased phloem δ13C values of the adult pines in the field experiment, compared to the corresponding controls. The respiration measurement experiment with young maple trees showed significantly increased δ13C-values in shoot respired CO2 at the time of four weeks after xylem infusion started. Our results clearly indicate that trees do translocate and metabolize exogenous sugars infused, and because the phloem layer is too thin, and thus xylem infusion can be better operated than phloem infusion. This tree infusion method developed here opens up new avenues and has great potential to be used for research on the whole plant C balance and its regulation in response to environmental factors and extreme stress conditions.

【 授权许可】

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Copyright © 2023 Zhang, Yang, Saurer, Schaub, Gessler, Lehmann, Rigling, Walser, Stierli, Hajjar, Christen and Li