Cold stress effects on reproductive development in grain crops: An overview

Grafting as a tool to improve tolerance of vegetables to abiotic stresses: Thermal stress, water stress and organic pollutants

Plants face a combination of different abiotic stresses under field conditions which are lethal to plant growth and production. Simultaneous occurrence of chilling and drought stresses in plants due to the drastic and rapid global climate changes, can alter the morphological, physiological and molecular responses. Both these stresses adversely affect the plant growth and yields due to physical damages, physiological and biochemical disruptions, and molecular changes. In general, the co-occurrence of chilling and drought combination is even worse for crop production rather than an individual stress condition. Plants attain various common and different physiological and molecular protective approaches for tolerance under chilling and drought stresses. Nevertheless, plant responses to a combination of chilling and drought stresses are unique from those to individual stress. In the present review, we summarized the recent evidence on plant responses to chilling and drought stresses on shared as well as unique basis and tried to find a common thread potentially underlying these responses. We addressed the possible cross talk between plant responses to these stresses and discussed the potential management strategies for regulating the mechanisms of plant tolerance to drought and/or chilling stresses. To date, various novel approaches have been tested in minimizing the negative effects of combine stresses. Despite of the main improvements there is still a big room for improvement in combination of drought and chilling tolerance. Thus, future researches particularly using biotechnological and molecular approaches should be carried out to develop genetically engineered plants with enhanced tolerance against these stress factors.

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Chilling and Drought Stresses in Crop Plants: Implications, Cross Talk, and Potential Management Opportunities

Vermicompost as a substitute for peat in potting media: Effects on germination, biomass allocation, yields and fruit quality of three tomato varieties

Plants are exposed to a wide range of environmental conditions and one of the major forces that shape the structure and function of plants are temperature stresses, which include low and high temperature stresses and considered as major abiotic stresses for crop plants. Due to global climate change, temperature stress is becoming the major area of concern for the researchers worldwide. The reactions of plants to these stresses are complex and have devastating effects on plant metabolism, disrupting cellular homeostasis and uncoupling major physiological and biochemical processes. Temperature stresses disrupt photosynthesis and increase photorespiration altering the normal homeostasis of plant cells. The constancy of temperature, among different metabolic equilibria present in plant cells, depends to a certain extent on a homeostatically regulated ratio of redox components, which are present virtually in all plant cells. Several pathways, which are present in plant cells, enable correct equilibrium of the plant cellular redox state and balance fluctuations in plant cells caused by changes in environment due to stressful conditions. In temperature stresses, high temperature stress is considered to be one of the major abiotic stresses for restricting crop production. The responses of plants to heat stress vary with extent of temperature increase, its duration and the type of plant. On other hand, low temperature as major environmental factor often affects plant growth and crop productivity and leads to substantial crop loses. The present review discusses how oxidative damage as a result of temperature stress is detrimental for various crops. Various strategies adapted by the plants to main redox homeostasis are described along with use of exogenous application of some stress protectants.

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Temperature stress and redox homeostasis in agricultural crops

The experiments were conducted on two tomato cultivars: Garbo and Robin. Mineral starvation due to plant growth in 20-fold diluted nutrient solution (DNS) combined with chilling reduced the rate of photosynthesis (P N) and stomatal conductance (g) to a greater extent than in plants grown in full nutrient solution (FNS). In phosphate-starved tomato plants the P N rate and stomatal conductance decreased more after chilling than in plants grown on FNS. In low-P plants even 2 days after chilling the recovery of CO2 assimilation rate and stomatal conductance was low. A resupply of phosphorus to low-P plants (low P + P) did not improve the rate of photosynthesis in non-chilled plants (NCh) but prevented P N inhibition in chilled (Ch) plants. The greatest effect of P resupply was expressed as a better recovery of photosynthesis and stomatal conductance, especially in non-chilled low P + P plants. The F v/F m (ratio of variable to maximal chlorophyll fluorescence) decreased more during P starvation than as an effect of chilling. Supplying phosphorus to low-P plants caused the slight increase in the F v/F mratio. In conclusion, after a short-term chilling in darkness a much more drastic inhibition of photosynthesis was observed in nutrient-starved or P-insufficient tomato plants than in plants from FNS. This inhibition was caused by the decrease in both photochemical efficiency of photosystems and the reduction of stomatal conductance. The presented results support the hypothesis that tomato plants with limited supply of mineral nutrients or phosphorus are more susceptible to chilling.

B. Niemyska

Papers

Response of tomato plants to chilling stress in association with nutrient or phosphorus starvation