Zhihang He, Xiaojuan Gu, Meng Su, Linyunhui Liu, Qifeng Mo
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引用次数: 0
Abstract
Background and aims
Phosphorus (P) limitation is common for plant growth and seedling regeneration in highly weathered soil of southern China. The responses of plant growth to various P supply are well conducted. However, the responses of different root orders of different functional tree seedlings to various soil P availability is still unclear.
Methods
A field-based manipulative experiment was carried out to investigate the responses of different orders of roots of Ormosia pinnata (N-fixing), Michelia macclurei (non-N-fixing), and Schima superba (non-N-fixing) seedlings to P addition in southern China.
Results
(1) P addition mainly changed the morphological traits of the 3rd order root of tree seedlings. N-fixing seedling tended to invest more resource in acquisition traits such as specific root length (SRL) rather than non-N-fixing species. (2) The contents of N and P in 3rd roots of non-N-fixing tree seedlings was greatly affected by external P addition, but only the P content in 1st order root was affected. P addition only increased the 3rd order root N:P ratio of N-fixing species. (3) P addition increased soluble sugar content while reduced starch contents in 2nd and 3rd order roots and greatly changed the distribution pattern of non-structural carbohydrates (NSC) of N-fixing seedling.
Conclusions
N-fixing seedling is relatively more adaptable to the environment of exogenous P addition and have stronger ability to use soil P. The physiological shapes of different functional seedlings such as root N and P contents and NSC contents to various P availability was divergent, which was tightly related to the root hierarchy of seedlings in southern China.
期刊介绍:
Plant and Soil publishes original papers and review articles exploring the interface of plant biology and soil sciences, and that enhance our mechanistic understanding of plant-soil interactions. We focus on the interface of plant biology and soil sciences, and seek those manuscripts with a strong mechanistic component which develop and test hypotheses aimed at understanding underlying mechanisms of plant-soil interactions. Manuscripts can include both fundamental and applied aspects of mineral nutrition, plant water relations, symbiotic and pathogenic plant-microbe interactions, root anatomy and morphology, soil biology, ecology, agrochemistry and agrophysics, as long as they are hypothesis-driven and enhance our mechanistic understanding. Articles including a major molecular or modelling component also fall within the scope of the journal. All contributions appear in the English language, with consistent spelling, using either American or British English.