Intergenerational and transgenerational effects of drought stress on winter wheat (Triticum aestivum L.)

Abstract

The environments where the progenitors are grown have the potential to affect the expression of traits in their offspring. Currently, there are various hypotheses regarding the evolutionary and ecological importance of stress memory effects. There is uncertainty regarding its occurrence, persistence, predictability, and adaptive value. In this study, 15 winter wheat cultivars were grown under drought and well‐watered (control) treatments for two seasons to produce seeds with all possible combinations of drought exposure histories. A comprehensive analysis to estimate transgenerational (grandparental effects), intergenerational (parental effects), and their combined memory effects on offspring traits under both control and drought moisture treatments, was performed. There were significant memory effects in most of the evaluated traits ranging from +787% to −39.0% changes in both seed quality and plant traits. The expression of stress memory was highly dependent on the generation and number of exposures, traits, and seasons. Under drought treatment, the combination of grandparental and parental stress memories was additive in all traits, but their strengths were variable when considered separately. Stress memory enhanced the performance of offspring under similar stressful conditions: increased plant height, above‐ground biomass, number of grains per plant, grain weight per plant and water potential. This study offers valuable new insights into the occurrence of drought stress memory, the complexities of the effects, possible physiological and metabolic alterations explaining the detected differences, and impacts toward a clearer understanding of their generation and context‐dependency.

Echoes of a Stressful Past: Abiotic Stress Memory in Crop Plants towards Enhanced Adaptation

“…Evidence suggest that drought memory development is a rather complex process, involving both intra-, inter-, and transgenerational mechanisms. A study performed recently in winter wheat showed that inter-and transgenerational drought stress memory development seem to have an additive effect towards offspring tolerance to drought stress, while variable effects were observed when both types of drought memory inheritance were considered separately [120]. This is also supported by the study by Tabassum et al (2018), who demonstrated that both terminal drought in wheat parental plants and seed osmopriming, either in combination or independently, improved drought tolerance in the offspring [121].…”

Effect of Low Temperature on Photosynthetic Characteristics, Senescence Characteristics, and Endogenous Hormones of Winter Wheat “Ji Mai 22” during the Jointing Stage

“…Among them, the Huang-Huai-Hai wheat-growing region in China is the largest wheat-producing area, with a wheat planting area of 240 million acres, accounting for 68% of China's wheat area. Therefore, safe production of winter wheat plays a vital role in ensuring China's-and global-food security [3]. The experimental materials in this study were selected from the largest winter wheat variety, "Ji Mai 22," in the Huang-Huai-Hai region of China.…”