An Assessment of Genetic Diversity and Drought Tolerance in Argan Tree (Argania spinosa) Populations: Potential for the Development of Improved Drought Tolerance

Abstract

The argan tree (Argania spinosa) occurs in a restricted area of Southwestern Morocco characterized by low water availability and high evapotranspirative demand. Despite the adaptation of the argan tree to drought stress, the extent of the argan forest has declined markedly due to increased aridity, land use changes and the expansion of olive cultivation. The oil of the argan seed is used for cooking and as the basis for numerous cosmetics. The identification of argan tree varieties with enhanced drought tolerance may minimize the economic losses associated with the decline of the argan forest and constrain the spread of desertification. In this study we collected argan ecotypes from four contrasting habitats and grew them under identical controlled environment conditions to investigate their response to drought. Leaf gas exchange analysis indicated that the argan ecotypes showed a high degree of adaptation to drought stress, maintaining photosynthetic activity at low levels of foliar water content and co-ordinating photosynthesis, stomatal behavior and metabolism. The stomata of the argan trees were highly sensitive to increased leaf to air vapor pressure deficit, representing an adaptation to growth in an arid environment where potential evapotranspiration is high. However, despite originating in contrasting environments, the four argan ecotypes exhibited similar gas exchange characteristics under both fully irrigated and water deficit conditions. Population genetic analyses using microsatellite markers indicated a high degree of relatedness between the four ecotypes; indicative of both artificial selection and the transport of ecotypes between different provinces throughout centuries of management of the argan forest. The majority of genetic variation across the four populations (71%) was observed between individuals, suggesting that improvement of argan is possible. Phenotypic screening of physiological responses to drought may prove effective in identifying individuals and then developing varieties with enhanced drought tolerance to enable the maintenance of argan production as climate change results in more frequent and severe drought events in Northern Africa.

Argan Oil-Mediated Attenuation of Organelle Dysfunction, Oxidative Stress and Cell Death Induced by 7-Ketocholesterol in Murine Oligodendrocytes 158N

“…The characteristics of argan oil in terms of quality and composition depend on numerous parameters: genetic and environmental factors (climate and altitude) but also the oil extraction process, soil type, the temperature, rain, drought, fruit maturity and the harvest year [ 20 , 21 , 44 ]. It is therefore important to determine the composition of argan oils and to establish whether they contain particular compounds and whether some of their compounds can have cytoprotective effects on appropriate cell and animal models.…”

Improvement of Drought Tolerance in Rice (Oryza sativa L.): Genetics, Genomic Tools, and the WRKY Gene Family

“…Alterations in any of these components change the overall photosynthetic rate. Mesophyll conductance ( g m) and stomatal conductance ( g s) to CO 2 often decrease under drought stress [ 163 ]. Hence, maintenance of the g m values under drought stress reflects the tolerance of rice to water deficits [ 164 ].…”

Opportunities and Limitations of Crop Phenotyping in Southern European Countries

“…Research in Italy has focused on phenotyping for selection of crop and fruit tree varieties with improved tolerance to environmental stresses, in particular heat stress and drought (e.g., Lauteri et al, 2014; Chakhchar et al, 2017; Haworth et al, 2018b). However, interest in different applications of plant phenotyping has also emerged recently.…”