Physiological, Transcriptomic, and Metabolic Responses of Ginkgo biloba L. to Drought, Salt, and Heat Stresses

Abstract

Ginkgo biloba L. is highly adaptable and resistant to a range of abiotic stressors, allowing its growth in various environments. However, it is unclear how G. biloba responds to common environmental stresses. We explored the physiological, transcriptomic, and metabolic responses of G. biloba to short-term drought, salt, and heat stresses. Proline, H2O2, and ABA contents, along with CAT activity, increased under all three types of stress. SOD activity increased under salt and heat stresses, while soluble protein and IAA contents decreased under drought and salt stresses. With respect to metabolites, D-glyceric acid increased in response to drought and salt stresses, whereas isomaltose 1, oxalamide, and threonine 2 increased under drought. Piceatannol 2,4-hydroxybutyrate and 1,3-diaminopropane increased under salt stress, whereas 4-aminobutyric acid 1 and galactonic acid increased in response to heat stress. Genes regulating nitrogen assimilation were upregulated only under drought, while the GRAS gene was upregulated under all three types of stressors. ARF genes were downregulated under heat stress, whereas genes encoding HSF and SPL were upregulated. Additionally, we predicted that miR156, miR160, miR172, and their target genes participate in stress responses. Our study provides valuable data for studying the multilevel response to drought, salinity, and heat in G. biloba.

Differential Response to Single and Combined Salt and Heat Stresses: Impact on Accumulation of Proteins and Metabolites in Dead Pericarps of Brassica juncea

“…Although an increase in global mean temperature by one degree Celsius is predicted to reduce significantly the yields of major crops such as wheat, rice, and maize [41], most detrimental effect on yield is exposure of crops during the reproductive stage to short episodes of high temperature (heatwave/warm spell) [42][43][44][45][46]. Thus, heatwaves and warm spells that are predicted to increase in frequency in many regions of the world [6,47,48] pose a serious threat to global food production.…”

“…Although not much is known about the role played by these sugars in plant growth and development, several reports have demonstrated increased abundance in plant tissues under stress conditions. Accordingly, an increase in isomaltose was reported under water stress conditions [48,66,67] or following exposure to ABA, salt, and cold in the moss Physcomitrella patens [68]. Cellobiose is the major product of cellulose hydrolysis by microorganisms and may function as a chemoattractant for motile cellulolytic bacteria such as Cellulomonas gelida [69].…”

miR160: An Indispensable Regulator in Plant

“…miR160a/b has been found strongly upregulated, which inversely correlated to the expression levels of their targets ARF10 ( Barrera-Figueroa et al, 2011 ). In Ginkgo biloba , miR160a decreased ARFs expression and took part in the drought stress tolerance through the IAA signaling pathway ( Chang et al, 2020 ). It is possible that the increase of miR160 and the concomitant decrease of ARF are part of the plant’s strategy to balance water loss and growth under drought.…”

Differential Metabolomic Responses of Kentucky Bluegrass Cultivars to Low Nitrogen Stress

“…All samples were analyzed by a combination of a gas chromatography system (United States, TRACE GC 1300) and a mass spectrometer (GC-TOF-MS) (Girardello et al, 2020). LECO's Chroma TOF 4.3 × software and LECO Fiehn Rtx5 database were used for original peak extraction, data baseline filtering, baseline calibration, peak alignment, deconvolution analysis, peak identification, and peak area integration (Chang et al, 2020). The retention time index (RI) method was used for peak identification, and the RI tolerance was set at 5000.…”