Are males and females of Populus cathayana differentially sensitive to Cd stress?

Abstract

This study clarifies the mechanisms of Cd uptake, translocation and detoxification in Populus cathayana Rehder females and males, and reveals a novel strategy for dioecious plants to cope with Cd contamination. Females exhibited a high degree of Cd uptake and root-to-shoot translocation, while males showed extensive Cd accumulation in roots, elevated antioxidative capacity, and effective cellular and bark Cd sequestration. Our study also found that Cd is largely located in epidermal and cortical tissues of male roots and leaves, while in females, more Cd was present in vascular tissues of roots and leaves, as well as in leaf mesophyll. In addition, the distributions of sulphur (S) and phosphorus (P) were very similar as that of Cd in males, but the associations were weak in females. Scanning electron microscopy and energy spectroscopy analysess suggested that the amounts of tissue Cd were positively correlated with P and S amounts in males, but not in females (a weak correlation between S and Cd). Transcriptional data suggested that Cd stress promoted the upregulation of genes related to Cd uptake and translocation in females, and that of genes related to cell wall biosynthesis, metal tolerance and secondary metabolism in males. Our results indicated that coordinated physiological, microstructural and transcriptional responses to Cd stress endowed superior Cd tolerance in males compared with females, and provided new insights into mechanisms underlying sexually differential responses to Cd stress.

Sex-Specific Physiological Responses of Populus cathayana to Uranium Stress

“…In our results, both male and female P. cathayana mainly enriched U in their roots, which is consistent with previous studies that showed that roots were the primary part of plants such as Amaranthus [33], sunflowers [34], and poplar trees [20,35] to accumulate heavy metals, including U. In further comparison with female trees, the male P. cathayana exhibited significantly higher U accumulation ability in roots without U detected in U can inhibit the growth of poplar [29], including plant height and biomass.…”

“…If resources are limited, reproduction directly competes with the other two processes (vegetative growth and stress resistance) [17][18][19]. Male trees experience non-biological stresses, such as ultraviolet radiation, temperature, humidity, and heavy metals, and are more resistant to these stressors than females [20,21]. With limited resources, female trees often invest more energy in reproduction, whereas male trees devote more resources to vegetative growth and stress resistance.…”

Anatomical variation of mesophyll conductance due to salt stress inPopulus cathayanafemales and males growing under different inorganic nitrogen sources

“…Poplars are dioecious species, in which females and males have significant differences in biomass partitioning, photosynthesis, carbon-nutrient balance and leaf anatomical traits when exposed to abiotic stresses, including salt stress , Chen et al 2016, Liu et al 2020a, Liu et al 2021, which is further affected by N forms (Chen et al 2011, Liu et al 2020b. Poplars preferentially take up NO3 − when both NH4 + and NO3 − are given at the same concentration, and growth may be accelerated despite high energy requirements (Bi et al 2020).…”

Cadmium is detrimental to Caenorhabditis elegans via a network involving circRNA, lncRNA and phosphorylated protein

“…Moreover, in-vivo and in-vitro experiments have shown that Cd is a mutagen that inhibits DNA repair 8 and reproductive function; experiments in rat testes showed inhibition by PI3K with the mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) signaling pathway, which is associated with autophagy and apoptosis 9 . Notably, females were more vulnerable to Cd exposure than males 10 , which would increase the risk of breast cancer (Dietary intake and urinary level of cadmium and breast cancer risk: A meta-analysis).…”