Long term effects of Chernobyl contamination on DNA repair function and plant resistance to different biotic and abiotic stress factors

Boubriak, Ivan; Akimkina, T.V.; Polischuk, V. P.; Дмитриев, А. П.; McCready, Shirley; Grodzinsky, D.M.

doi:10.3103/s0095452716060049

Cited by 34 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 109 publications

(130 reference statements)

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“…While there is no clear evidence for the existence of hormesis (i.e., superior fitness at low levels of radiation exposure compared with controls and high levels of radiation exposure) related to radiation exposure from the Chernobyl accident, adaptations to radioactive contamination have already been detected . For example, a Scots pine seed from the 1997 Chernobyl collection showed a higher resistance to acute gamma irradiation in spite of an increased frequency of aberrant cells in the progeny (Boubriak et al 2016).…”

Section: Adaptationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Landscape changes at Chernobyl

Santos¹,

Sillero²,

Boratyński³

et al. 2019

Remote Sensing for Agriculture, Ecosystems, and Hydrology XXI

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Thirty-two years ago, the Chernobyl nuclear accident changed the lives of many people, when one of the nuclear reactors exploded during a safety test. The explosion released huge amounts of radioactive materials like caesium, strontium, and plutonium into the atmosphere. High doses of radiation caused severe damage to the DNA of living beings, with direct impact on the changes suffered by the environment, either by causing instant death or by altering the fitness of the local biota. As people were evacuated from the surrounding areas, the land was left abandoned and the indirect changes caused by the alteration of land use are still unknown. Thus, the objective of this study was to analyse the state of primary production of the vegetation in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone after the accident, comparing with its previous state. Through Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and radiation measurements, the relationship between these variables was assessed using Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and Generalized Additive Models (GAM), to understand how the vegetation responded to the radiation exposure. The data was obtained through remote sensing, using available Landsat satellite imagery and sampled areas registered on the field. The results show that the NDVI increased over the years after the accident and that it is independent of the current radiation measured. This suggests that to some level of radiation exposure, the positive effects of land abandonment and/or the negative effects of radiation on abundance of herbivore species surpass the long term negative effects of radiation exposure on the vegetation. Nonetheless, above some radiation threshold level, primary production is expected to be negatively affected.

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Section: Adaptationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Landscape changes at Chernobyl

Santos¹,

Sillero²,

Boratyński³

et al. 2019

Remote Sensing for Agriculture, Ecosystems, and Hydrology XXI

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“…Based on these observations, long-term exposure to the chronic radiation stress may Plants inhabiting areas around the CNPP accumulate radionuclides from external sources, soil and also internally from plant surface (Hinton et al, 1995;Boubriak et al, 2016). Among mechanisms which the most likely trigger the adaptation process belong the upregulation of DNA repairs such single and double strand breaks (Boubriak et al, 2016). For instance, Georgieva et al (2016) in Arabidopsis plants Boubriak et al, 2016).…”

Section: Stress Factors and Transposon Activationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Among mechanisms which the most likely trigger the adaptation process belong the upregulation of DNA repairs such single and double strand breaks (Boubriak et al, 2016). For instance, Georgieva et al (2016) in Arabidopsis plants Boubriak et al, 2016).…”

Section: Stress Factors and Transposon Activationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Radioactive contamination in Chernobyl and (epi)genetic stability of plants – A review

Lancíková¹,

Žiarovská²

2020

j. cent. eur. agric.

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Rapid industrial and agricultural development brought, besides the indisputable advances, also risks related to the environmental pollution. Widespread soil deterioration represents a global problem. Chernobyl area contaminated by radionuclides after nuclear accident in 1986 provides the opportunity to analyze in situ the impact of radiation on plant systems. Unlike animals and humans, plants are not able to move to another place with better living conditions. Therefore, plants are an ideal object to study adaptation to the conditions of environmental stress. Long-term exposure to the ionizing radiation causes widespread changes in plant genome and epigenome. Also, these alterations may result in changed phenotype. In particular, this review discusses the effect of ionizing radiation on genetic and epigenetic stability of plant genome.

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“…The presence of trans-generational effects has perhaps helped prompt some discussion about ‘adaptation’ of plants to chronic low-level doses of IR. For example, studies of flax and soya seeds grown over several generations near the Chernobyl NPP have shown differences in seed constituents and prompted suggestions of adaptation to chronic low dose IR ( Gabrisova et al, 2016 and references therein), as have effects of high doses on pollen ( Boubriak et al, 2008 ), the ability of plants from Chernobyl to resist the effects of mutagens ( Kovalchuk et al, 2004 ) and studies at a number of other contaminated sites (e.g., Geras’kin et al, 2013 ; Møller and Mousseau, 2015 ; Boubriak et al, 2016 ). These references, and references therein, provide evidence that at chronic low doses in the range of a few 10 s of μGy/h, some plants can have increased heterozygosity, increased rates of DNA repair, and increased variability of key seed properties and constituents.…”

Section: The Effects Of Ionizing Radiation On Plantsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ionizing Radiation, Higher Plants, and Radioprotection: From Acute High Doses to Chronic Low Doses

2018

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Understanding the effects of ionizing radiation (IR) on plants is important for environmental protection, for agriculture and horticulture, and for space science but plants have significant biological differences to the animals from which much relevant knowledge is derived. The effects of IR on plants are understood best at acute high doses because there have been; (a) controlled experiments in the field using point sources, (b) field studies in the immediate aftermath of nuclear accidents, and (c) controlled laboratory experiments. A compilation of studies of the effects of IR on plants reveals that although there are numerous field studies of the effects of chronic low doses on plants, there are few controlled experiments that used chronic low doses. Using the Bradford-Hill criteria widely used in epidemiological studies we suggest that a new phase of chronic low-level radiation research on plants is desirable if its effects are to be properly elucidated. We emphasize the plant biological contexts that should direct such research. We review previously reported effects from the molecular to community level and, using a plant stress biology context, discuss a variety of acute high- and chronic low-dose data against Derived Consideration Reference Levels (DCRLs) used for environmental protection. We suggest that chronic low-level IR can sometimes have effects at the molecular and cytogenetic level at DCRL dose rates (and perhaps below) but that there are unlikely to be environmentally significant effects at higher levels of biological organization. We conclude that, although current data meets only some of the Bradford-Hill criteria, current DCRLs for plants are very likely to be appropriate at biological scales relevant to environmental protection (and for which they were intended) but that research designed with an appropriate biological context and with more of the Bradford-Hill criteria in mind would strengthen this assertion. We note that the effects of IR have been investigated on only a small proportion of plant species and that research with a wider range of species might improve not only the understanding of the biological effects of radiation but also that of the response of plants to environmental stress.

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Long term effects of Chernobyl contamination on DNA repair function and plant resistance to different biotic and abiotic stress factors

Cited by 34 publications

References 109 publications

Landscape changes at Chernobyl

Landscape changes at Chernobyl

Radioactive contamination in Chernobyl and (epi)genetic stability of plants – A review

Ionizing Radiation, Higher Plants, and Radioprotection: From Acute High Doses to Chronic Low Doses

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