Plants-Basel最新文献

{"title":"Comparative Genomic Analysis of COMT Family Genes in Three <i>Vitis</i> Species Reveals Evolutionary Relationships and Functional Divergence.","authors":"Yashi Liu, Zhiyuan Bian, Shan Jiang, Xiao Wang, Lin Jiao, Yun Shao, Chengmei Ma, Mingyu Chu","doi":"10.3390/plants14132079","DOIUrl":"10.3390/plants14132079","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Caffeic acid-O-methyltransferase (COMT) is a key enzyme in lignin synthesis and secondary metabolism in plants, and it participates in the regulation of plant growth and development as well as plants' stress response. To further investigate the function of COMT in grapevine, a total of 124 <i>COMT</i> family genes were identified from three <i>Vitis</i> species in this study, namely Pinot noir (<i>Vitis vinifera</i> L.), <i>Vitis amurensis</i>, and <i>Vitis riparia</i>. The amino acid sequence encoded by these genes ranged from 55 to 1422 aa, and their molecular mass ranged from 6640.82 to 77,034.43 Da. Subcellular localization prediction inferred that they were mainly located in the plasma membrane and cytoplasm. The prediction of secondary structures showed that α-helix and irregular coiled-coil were primary structural elements. These genes were unevenly distributed across 10 different chromosomes, respectively. Phylogenetic tree analysis of the amino acid sequences of VvCOMT, VaCOMT, VrCOMT, and AtCOMT proteins showed that they were closely related and were divided into four subgroups. The motif distribution was similar among the cluster genes, and the gene sequence was notably conserved. The 124 members of the COMT gene family possessed a variable number of exons, ranging from 2 to 13. The promoter region of all of these <i>COMTs</i> genes contained multiple cis-acting elements related to hormones (e.g., ABA, IAA, MeJA, GA, and SA), growth and development (e.g., endosperm, circadian, meristem, light response), and various stress responses (e.g., drought, low temperature, wounding, anaerobic, defense, and stress). The intraspecies collinearity analysis suggested that there were one pair, three pairs, and six pairs of collinear genes in <i>Va</i>, Pinot noir, and <i>Vr</i>, respectively, and that tandem duplication contributed more to the expansion of these gene family members. In addition, interspecific collinearity revealed that the <i>VvCOMTs</i> had the strongest homology with the <i>VaCOMTs,</i> followed by the <i>VrCOMTs</i>, and the weakest homology with the <i>AtCOMTs</i>. The expression patterns of different tissues and organs at different developmental stages indicated that the <i>VvCOMT</i> genes had obvious tissue expression specificity. The majority of <i>VvCOMT</i> genes were only expressed at higher levels in certain tissues. Furthermore, we screened 13 <i>VvCOMT</i> genes to conduct qRT-PCR verification according to the transcriptome data of <i>VvCOMTs</i> under abiotic stresses (NaCl, PEG, and cold). The results confirmed that these genes were involved in the responses to NaCl, PEG, and cold stress. This study lays a foundation for the exploration of the function of the COMT genes, and is of great importance for the genetic improvement of abiotic stress resistance in grapes.</p>","PeriodicalId":56267,"journal":{"name":"Plants-Basel","volume":"14 13","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.0,"publicationDate":"2025-07-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12252248/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144621315","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Transcriptome Profiling of Spike Development Reveals Key Genes and Pathways Associated with Early Heading in Wheat-<i>Psathyrstachys huashanica</i> 7Ns Chromosome Addition Line.","authors":"Binwen Tan, Yangqiu Xie, Hang Peng, Miaomiao Wang, Wei Zhu, Lili Xu, Yiran Cheng, Yi Wang, Jian Zeng, Xing Fan, Lina Sha, Haiqin Zhang, Peng Qin, Yonghong Zhou, Dandan Wu, Yinghui Li, Houyang Kang","doi":"10.3390/plants14132077","DOIUrl":"10.3390/plants14132077","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Developing early-heading wheat cultivars is an important breeding strategy to utilize light and heat resources, facilitate multiple-cropping systems, and enhance annual grain yield. <i>Psathyrostachys huashanica</i> Keng (2<i>n</i> = 2<i>x</i> = 14, NsNs) possesses numerous agronomically beneficial traits for wheat improvement, such as early maturity and resistance to biotic and abiotic stresses. In this study, we found that a cytogenetically stable wheat-<i>P. huashanica</i> 7Ns disomic addition line showed (9-11 days) earlier heading and (8-10 days) earlier maturation than its wheat parents. Morphological observations of spike differentiation revealed that the 7Ns disomic addition line developed distinctly faster than its wheat parents from the double ridge stage. To explore the potential molecular mechanisms underlying the early heading, we performed transcriptome analysis at four different developmental stages of the 7Ns disomic addition line and its wheat parents. A total of 10,043 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified during spike development. Gene Ontology (GO) enrichment analysis showed that these DEGs were linked to the carbohydrate metabolic process, photosynthesis, response to abscisic acid, and the ethylene-activated signaling pathway. Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) enrichment analysis showed that these DEGs were involved in plant hormone signal transduction (<i>ARF</i>, <i>AUX/IAA</i>, <i>SAUR</i>, <i>DELLA</i>, <i>BRI1</i>, and <i>ETR</i>), starch and sucrose metabolism (<i>SUS1</i> and <i>TPP</i>), photosynthetic antenna proteins (<i>Lhc</i>), and circadian rhythm (<i>PRR37</i>, <i>FT</i>, <i>Hd3a</i>, <i>COL</i>, and <i>CDF</i>) pathways. In addition, several DEGs annotated as transcription factors (TFs), such as bHLH, bZIP, MADS-box, MYB, NAC, SBP, WRKY, and NF-Y, may be related to flowering time. Our findings reveal spike development-specific gene expression and critical regulatory pathways associated with early heading in the wheat-<i>P. huashanica</i> 7Ns addition line, and provide a new genetic resource for further dissection of the molecular mechanisms underlying the heading date in wheat.</p>","PeriodicalId":56267,"journal":{"name":"Plants-Basel","volume":"14 13","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.0,"publicationDate":"2025-07-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12252408/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144621468","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Living Landmarks: A Review of Monumental Trees and Their Role in Ecosystems.","authors":"Ruben Budău, Claudia Simona Cleopatra Timofte, Ligia Valentina Mirisan, Mariana Bei, Lucian Dinca, Gabriel Murariu, Karoly Alexandru Racz","doi":"10.3390/plants14132075","DOIUrl":"10.3390/plants14132075","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Monumental trees, defined by their exceptional size, form, and age, are critical components of both cultural heritage and ecological systems. However, their conservation faces increasing threats from habitat fragmentation, climate change, and inadequate public policies. This review synthesized global research on monumental trees by analyzing 204 peer-reviewed articles published between 1989 and 2024 that were sourced from Web of Science and Scopus. Our bibliometric analysis highlighted <i>Olea europaea</i> and <i>Castanea sativa</i> as the most frequently studied species and identified a surge in publications after 2019, particularly from the USA, Italy, and Spain. Key research themes included conservation, biodiversity, and ecosystem services. The methodological approaches varied globally, encompassing ranking systems; GIS mapping; remote sensing; and non-invasive diagnostic tools, such as acoustic tomography and chlorophyll fluorescence. Conservation strategies discussed included vegetative propagation, cryopreservation, and legal risk management. Despite advances in these techniques, significant gaps remain in effectively addressing environmental pressures and integrating multidisciplinary approaches. We concluded that targeted, interdisciplinary strategies are essential to safeguard monumental trees as vital ecological and cultural landmarks.</p>","PeriodicalId":56267,"journal":{"name":"Plants-Basel","volume":"14 13","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.0,"publicationDate":"2025-07-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12252282/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144621369","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Calliviminone A from <i>Callistemon citrinus</i> Induces PANC-1 Pancreatic Cancer Cell Death by Targeting the PI3K/Akt/mTOR Pathway.","authors":"Juthamart Maneenet, Ahmed M Tawila, Hung Hong Nguyen, Nguyen Duy Phan, Orawan Monthakantirat, Supawadee Daodee, Chantana Boonyarat, Charinya Khamphukdee, Yaowared Chulikhit, Suresh Awale","doi":"10.3390/plants14132074","DOIUrl":"10.3390/plants14132074","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Pancreatic cancer cells exhibit a remarkable ability to tolerate nutrient deprivation, a phenomenon termed \"austerity,\" which enables their survival within the hypovascular tumor microenvironment. Conventional anticancer therapies frequently fail to effectively target these resilient neoplastic cells, posing a significant challenge to the therapeutic management of pancreatic cancer. Consequently, targeting austerity, the ability of cancer cells to tolerate nutrient starvation, represents a promising anti-austerity strategy for developing novel pancreatic cancer therapeutics. In this study, we investigated calliviminone A (CVM-A), a phloroglucinol-meroterpenoid isolated from <i>Callistemon citrinus</i> leaves, for its anti-austerity activity against PANC-1 human pancreatic cancer cells. Calliviminone A exhibited potent preferential cytotoxicity in nutrient-deprived medium (NDM) with a PC₅₀ of 0.57 µM, while showing minimal toxicity in nutrient-rich Dulbecco's Modified Eagle's medium (IC₅₀ = 45.2 µM), indicating a favorable therapeutic index. Real-time live-cell imaging revealed that CVM-A induced significant morphological changes, including cell shrinkage and membrane blebbing, leading to cell death within 24 h of NDM. Furthermore, under normal nutrient conditions in Dulbecco's Modified Eagle's Medium (DMEM), CVM-A significantly inhibited PANC-1 cell migration (up to 47% reduction at 20 µM) and colony formation (over 80% suppression at 25 µM), suggesting its antimetastatic potential. Western blot studies demonstrated that CVM-A downregulated key survival components of the PI3K/Akt/mTOR signaling pathway, completely inhibiting Akt and p-Akt at 2.5 µM in NDM, and suppressing insulin-induced Akt activation. These findings highlight CVM-A as a promising lead compound for developing novel anticancer therapies that target the adaptive survival mechanisms and metastatic potential of pancreatic cancer in nutrient-deprived microenvironments.</p>","PeriodicalId":56267,"journal":{"name":"Plants-Basel","volume":"14 13","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.0,"publicationDate":"2025-07-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12252234/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144621309","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Hydrogen Peroxide and Vitexin in the Signaling and Defense Responses of <i>Passiflora incarnata</i> Under Drought Stress.","authors":"Felipe G Campos, Gustavo R Barzotto, Isabela Melo-Figueiredo, Jonas A V Pagassini, Carmen S F Boaro","doi":"10.3390/plants14132078","DOIUrl":"10.3390/plants14132078","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂) functions as a signaling molecule that triggers physiological and biochemical adjustments that help plants cope with environmental stress. This study evaluated the effects of foliar application of 1.5 mM H₂O₂ on the physiological and biochemical responses of <i>Passiflora incarnata</i> subjected to 14 days of drought stress followed by 5 days of rehydration. Drought reduced Fv/Fm and photochemical efficiency, as well as stomatal conductance and transpiration rates. H₂O₂ treatment under drought further reduced stomatal conductance and transpiration, suggesting enhanced water conservation. Drought-stressed plants treated with H₂O₂ exhibited increased concentrations of glucose, fructose, and mannose along with reduced sucrose levels, indicating osmotic adjustment and energy mobilization. Enzymatic antioxidant activity, particularly that of superoxide dismutase and catalase, increased with H₂O₂ treatment, while peroxidase activity remained low. The content of vitexin, arabinose, and trehalose decreased under drought, likely due to their roles in membrane protection, as MDA levels remained stable. After rehydration, Fv/Fm and ΦPSII recovered, and H₂O₂-treated plants showed higher carbon assimilation and carboxylation efficiency. These results indicate that H₂O₂ promotes drought acclimation and enhances post-stress recovery in <i>P. incarnata</i>. We conclude that H₂O₂ induces signaling pathways, with trehalose, arabinose, and vitexin contributing to the regeneration of the photochemical apparatus, as well as defense and acclimation under drought conditions.</p>","PeriodicalId":56267,"journal":{"name":"Plants-Basel","volume":"14 13","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.0,"publicationDate":"2025-07-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12252318/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144621352","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Molecular Networks Governing Plant Responses to Heat and Cold Stress.","authors":"Ran Zhang, Lin Yang, Huan Zhang, Yingyu Yang, Lu Wen, Aoran Yin, Liwen Fu","doi":"10.3390/plants14132073","DOIUrl":"10.3390/plants14132073","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Global warming is leading to an increase in extreme-temperature events, posing a significant threat to crop productivity and global food security. Plants have evolved sophisticated mechanisms to perceive and respond to both heat and cold stress. While these mechanisms share certain similarities, they also exhibit distinct differences, enabling plants to effectively cope with extreme temperatures. This review summarizes recent findings on the mechanisms underlying plant perception and response to extreme temperature stresses. Additionally, we compare the signaling pathways for heat and cold stress in plants and discuss the remaining challenges in the field. Finally, we address unresolved issues and propose future directions.</p>","PeriodicalId":56267,"journal":{"name":"Plants-Basel","volume":"14 13","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.0,"publicationDate":"2025-07-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12252174/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144621379","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Resource-Efficient Cotton Network: A Lightweight Deep Learning Framework for Cotton Disease and Pest Classification.","authors":"Zhengle Wang, Heng-Wei Zhang, Ying-Qiang Dai, Kangning Cui, Haihua Wang, Peng W Chee, Rui-Feng Wang","doi":"10.3390/plants14132082","DOIUrl":"10.3390/plants14132082","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Cotton is the most widely cultivated natural fiber crop worldwide, yet it is highly susceptible to various diseases and pests that significantly compromise both yield and quality. To enable rapid and accurate diagnosis of cotton diseases and pests-thus supporting the development of effective control strategies and facilitating genetic breeding research-we propose a lightweight model, the Resource-efficient Cotton Network (RF-Cott-Net), alongside an open-source image dataset, CCDPHD-11, encompassing 11 disease categories. Built upon the MobileViTv2 backbone, RF-Cott-Net integrates an early exit mechanism and quantization-aware training (QAT) to enhance deployment efficiency without sacrificing accuracy. Experimental results on CCDPHD-11 demonstrate that RF-Cott-Net achieves an accuracy of 98.4%, an F1-score of 98.4%, a precision of 98.5%, and a recall of 98.3%. With only 4.9 M parameters, 310 M FLOPs, an inference time of 3.8 ms, and a storage footprint of just 4.8 MB, RF-Cott-Net delivers outstanding accuracy and real-time performance, making it highly suitable for deployment on agricultural edge devices and providing robust support for in-field automated detection of cotton diseases and pests.</p>","PeriodicalId":56267,"journal":{"name":"Plants-Basel","volume":"14 13","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.0,"publicationDate":"2025-07-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12252015/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144621430","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Genomic Insights and Plant Growth-Promoting Characterization of <i>Priestia megaterium</i> Strain 53B2, Isolated from Maize-Associated Soil in the Yaqui Valley, Mexico.","authors":"Alina Escalante-Beltrán, Pamela Helué Morales-Sandoval, Claudia Berenice González-Astorga, Amelia C Montoya-Martínez, Edgar A Cubedo-Ruiz, Gustavo Santoyo, Fannie Isela Parra-Cota, Sergio de Los Santos-Villalobos","doi":"10.3390/plants14132081","DOIUrl":"10.3390/plants14132081","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Strain 53B2 was isolated from a commercial maize (<i>Zea mays</i> L.) field located in the Yaqui Valley, Mexico. Its draft genome comprises 5,844,085 bp, with a G + C content of 37.5%, an N50 of 602,122 bp, an L50 of 4, and a total of 129 contigs. Genome-based taxonomic affiliation showed this strain belonged to <i>Priestia megaterium</i>. Genome annotation revealed 6394 coding DNA sequences (CDSs), organized into 332 subsystems. Among these, several CDSs were associated with traits relevant to plant growth promotion, including categories such as iron acquisition and metabolism (40 CDSs) and secondary metabolism (6 CDSs), among others. In vitro metabolic assays supported genomic predictions, confirming the strain's ability to produce IAA, solubilize phosphate, and tolerate abiotic stress. Additionally, greenhouse trials demonstrated that inoculation with <i>Priestia megaterium</i> 53B2 significantly enhanced plant growth parameters (<i>p</i> ≤ 0.05) versus uninoculated control: stem height increased by 22.8%, root length by 35.7%, stem and root fresh weights by 39.6% and 66.1%, and stem and root dry weights by 33.7% and 44.7%, respectively. This first report on the beneficial potential of <i>Priestia megaterium</i> 53B2 highlights its potential as a sustainable bioinoculant for maize cultivation.</p>","PeriodicalId":56267,"journal":{"name":"Plants-Basel","volume":"14 13","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.0,"publicationDate":"2025-07-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12251681/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144621250","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Adaptive Symmetry Self-Matching for 3D Point Cloud Completion of Occluded Tomato Fruits in Complex Canopy Environments.","authors":"Wenqin Wang, Chengda Lin, Haiyu Shui, Ke Zhang, Ruifang Zhai","doi":"10.3390/plants14132080","DOIUrl":"10.3390/plants14132080","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>As a globally important cash crop, the optimization of tomato yield and quality is strategically significant for food security and sustainable agricultural development. In order to address the problem of missing point cloud data on fruits in a facility agriculture environment due to complex canopy structure, leaf shading and limited collection viewpoints, the traditional geometric fitting method makes it difficult to restore the real morphology of fruits due to the dependence on data integrity. This study proposes an adaptive symmetry self-matching (ASSM) algorithm. It dynamically adjusts symmetry planes by detecting defect region characteristics in real time, implements point cloud completion under multi-symmetry constraints and constructs a triple-orthogonal symmetry plane system to adapt to multi-directional heterogeneous structures under complex occlusion. Experiments conducted on 150 tomato fruits with 5-70% occlusion rates demonstrate that ASSM achieved coefficient of determination (R²) values of 0.9914 (length), 0.9880 (width) and 0.9349 (height) under high occlusion, reducing the root mean square error (RMSE) by 23.51-56.10% compared with traditional ellipsoid fitting. Further validation on eggplant fruits confirmed the cross-crop adaptability of the method. The proposed ASSM method overcomes conventional techniques' data integrity dependency, providing high-precision three-dimensional (3D) data for monitoring plant growth and enabling accurate phenotyping in smart agricultural systems.</p>","PeriodicalId":56267,"journal":{"name":"Plants-Basel","volume":"14 13","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.0,"publicationDate":"2025-07-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12252095/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144621284","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Functional Trait Responses of <i>Brasenia schreberi</i> to Water and Soil Conditions Reveal Its Endangered Status.","authors":"Jingyu Yao, Zhenya Liu, Junbao Yu, Yun Zhang, Rui Xu, Jiahua Li, Yang Xu, Mei Sun","doi":"10.3390/plants14132072","DOIUrl":"10.3390/plants14132072","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>[Background] <i>Brasenia schreberi</i> is a perennial floating leaf aquatic plant with high ecological protection value and potential for economic development, and thus, its endangered mechanisms are of great concern. The rapid endangerment of this species in modern times may be primarily attributed to the deterioration of water and soil environmental conditions, as its growth relies on high-quality water and soil. [Objective] Exploring the responses of <i>B. schreberi</i> to water and soil conditions from the perspective of functional traits is of great significance for understanding its endangered mechanisms and implementing effective conservation strategies. [Methods] This study was conducted in the Tengchong Beihai Wetland, which has the largest natural habitat of <i>B. schreberi</i> in China. By measuring the key functional traits of <i>B. schreberi</i> and detecting the water and soil parameters at the collecting sites, the responses of these functional traits to the water and soil conditions have been investigated. [Results] (1) The growth status of <i>B. schreberi</i> affects the expression of its functional traits. Compared with sporadic distribution, <i>B. schreberi</i> in continuous patches have significantly higher stomatal conductance, intercellular CO₂ concentration, transpiration rate, and vein density, while these plants have significantly smaller leaf area and perimeter. (2) Good water quality directly promotes photosynthetic, morphological, and structural traits. However, high soil carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus contents can inhibit the photosynthetic rate. The net photosynthetic rate is significantly positively correlated with dissolved oxygen content, pH value, ammonia nitrogen, and nitrate nitrogen contents in the water, as well as the magnesium, zinc, and silicon contents in the soil. In contrast, the net photosynthetic rate is significantly negatively correlated with the total phosphorus content in water and the total carbon, total nitrogen, and total phosphorus content in the soil. (3) Leaf area and perimeter show positive correlations with various water parameters, including the depth, temperature, pH value, dissolved oxygen content, ammonium nitrogen, and nitrate nitrogen content, yet they are negatively correlated with total phosphorus content, chemical oxygen demand, biological oxygen demand, and permanganate index of water. [Conclusions] This study supports the idea that <i>B. schreberi</i> thrives in oligotrophic water environments, while the notion that fertile soil is required for its growth still needs to be investigated more thoroughly.</p>","PeriodicalId":56267,"journal":{"name":"Plants-Basel","volume":"14 13","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.0,"publicationDate":"2025-07-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12252049/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144621340","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}