Morphological and physiological plasticity of alpine medicinal plants along an elevational gradient

Abstract

Alpine medicinal plant growth, physiological processes and final number of metabolites are affected by elevation, demonstrating phenotypic plasticity. Therefore, in-depth understanding the alpine medicinal plant behaviors in responding to shift elevation has actually implications for resources protection, sustainable utilization and domestication cultivation. Currently, lots of literature detailly studied the effect of environmental factors on the synthesis and metabolism of second metabolisms in medicinal plants while the responding results of phenotype and metabolism to constrain environmental still lack systematic classification and summary. Hence, basing on previous works and literature, the adjustment of morphology and metabolism of alpine medicinal plants in responding of shift elevation were systematically outlined. The results of this reviews can know how the alpine plant adapting to shift elevation through physiological, metabolic and morphological adaptation. And this knowledge can be integrated into a framework for domesticating and protecting alpine medicinal plants, and can also serve as a quick tool to study the effects of climate warming on plateau medicinal plants.