Similarity and diversity in adventitious root anatomy as related to root aeration among a range of wetland and dryland grass species

By M. McDonald, N. Galwey, Timothy D. Colmer. 2002

182 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Assessments of the anatomy, porosity and profiles of radial O 2 loss from adventitious roots of 10 species in the Poaceae (from four subfamilies) and two species in the Cyperaceae identified a combination of features characteristic of species that inhabit wetland environments. These include a strong barrier to radial O 2 loss in the basal regions of the adventitious roots and extensive aerenchyma formation when grown not only in stagnant but also in aerated nutrient solution. Adventitious root porosity was greater for plants grown in stagnant compared with aerated solution, for all 10 species in the Poaceae. The ‘wetland root’ archetype was best developed in Oryza sativa and the two species of the Cyperaceae, in which the stele contributed less than 5% of the root cross-sectional area, the cells of the inner cortex were packed in a cuboidal arrangement, and aerenchyma was up to 35‐52%. Variations of this root structure, in which the proportional and absolute area of stele was greater, with hexagonal arrangements of cells in the inner cortex and varying in the extent of aerenchyma formation, were present in the other wetland species from the subfamilies Pooideae, Panicoideae and Arundinoideae. Of particular interest were Vetiveria zizanoides and V. filipes , wetland grass species from the tribe Andropogoneae (the same tribe as sorghum, maize and sugarcane), that had a variant of the root anatomy found in rice. The results are promising with regard to enhancing these traits in waterlogging intolerant crops.

Subfields: Ecology, Plant Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/c370042035675ac0ae5a5fa086a8f629abf955c5

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Ecology

In Plant Science

Citations in the corpus

Long-distance transport of gases in plants: a perspective on internal aeration and radial oxygen loss from roots (2003, background): “…wetland species contain a barrier to ROL in the basal zones (Armstrong 1964, 1971; Smits et al. 1990; Koncalova 1990; Jackson & Armstrong 1999; Armstrong et al. 2000; Visser et al. 2000b; McDonald et al. 2002) and a barrier to ROL has also been shown in roots of a sea grass (Connell et al. 1999).”
Morphological and physiological traits for higher biomass production in perennial rhizomatous grasses grown on marginal land (2015, background): “Some PRGs such as Phalaris arundinacea and Arundo donax (McDonald et al., 2002) are well adapted to waterlogged conditions and Etherington (1984) found differences in flooding tolerance among genotypes of D. glomerata.”
Flooding Stress on Plants: Anatomical, Morphological and Physiological Responses (2012, background): “Aerenchyma formation in the root cortex is the most studied plastic response to flooding (Smirnoff & Crawford, 1983; Justin & Armstrong, 1987; Colmer et al., 1998; Visser et al., 2000; McDonald et al., 2002; Evans, 2003; Grimoldi et al., 2005; Seago et al., 2005; Striker et al., 2007a).”
Oxygen Movement in Seagrasses (2007, background): “To ensure sufficient oxygen supply along the length of roots to the root apex, the radial loss from root surfaces of seagrasses and other aquatic plants seems to decline substantially with increasing distance to root tips (Fig. 6; Armstrong, 1971; Connell et al., 1999; Armstrong et al., 2000; McDona”
Plant root growth, architecture and function (2009, background): “The plant species present is also a factor as many wetland plant species are capable of forming a barrier to ROL in root basal areas, thus ensuring oxygen reaches the root apex allowing continued root growth (Armstrong et al. 1991; McDonald et al. 2002).”
Flooding stress: acclimations and genetic diversity. (2008, unknown): “Also, other studies confirmed the strong correlation between high root porosities and occurrence in wet environments (45, 77, 143).”
Biogeography of the grasses (Poaceae): a phylogenetic approach to reveal evolutionary history in geographical space and geological time (2010, background): “Mesophytic plants are adapted to soils of moderate moisture content and xerophytic plants to arid and low water availability soils (McDonald et al., 2002).”