Co-ordination between leaf biomechanical resistance and hydraulic safety across 30 sub-tropical woody species

Abstract

Background and Aims Leaf biomechanical resistance protects leaves from biotic and abiotic damage. Previous studies have revealed that enhancing leaf biomechanical resistance is costly for plant species and leads to an increase in leaf drought tolerance. We thus predicted that there is a functional correlation between leaf hydraulic safety and biomechanical characteristics. Methods We measured leaf morphological and anatomical traits, pressure–volume parameters, maximum leaf hydraulic conductance (Kleaf-max), leaf water potential at 50% loss of hydraulic conductance (P50leaf), leaf hydraulic safety margin (SMleaf), and leaf force to tear (Ft) and punch (Fp) of 30 co-occurring woody species in a subtropical evergreen broadleaved forest. Linear regression analysis was performed to examine the relationships between biomechanical resistance and other leaf hydraulic traits. Key Results We found that higher Ft and Fp values were significantly associated with a lower (more negative) P50leaf and a larger SMleaf, thereby confirming the correlation between leaf biomechanical resistance and hydraulic safety. However, leaf biomechanical resistance showed no correlation with Kleaf-max, although it was significantly and negatively correlated with leaf outside-xylem hydraulic conductance. In addition, we also found that there was a significant correlation between biomechanical resistance and the modulus of elasticity by excluding an outlier. Conclusions The findings of this study reveal leaf biomechanical-hydraulic safety correlation in subtropical woody species.

Coordination of pinna, petiole, and root anatomical traits in 24 tropical‐subtropical fern species

“…Grey regions represent 95% confidence intervals of the fitted lines. Blue: 24 fern species; Red: 156 tropical‐subtropical woody angiosperms (Li et al, 2015; Wang et al, 2021; our unpublished data). ns, P > 0.05; **, P < 0.01.…”

“…To compare the difference in structural coordination between ferns and angiosperms in tropical and subtropical forests (southern China), we collected the leaf traits (leaf thickness, SD, and VD) of 156 woody angiosperm species from our unpublished data and the published literature (Li et al 2015; Wang et al, 2021), and absorptive root (second‐order) anatomical traits (RD, SD r , CT, and CS) of 54 woody angiosperm species from the published literature (Huang, 2010; Xu, 2011; Long et al, 2013; Xu, 2021). For these angiosperm species, all the anatomical traits (see Table S3–S4) were measured from mature individuals using the same methods during the growing season.…”