Temperature sensitivity of food legumes: a physiological insight

Abstract

Of the various environmental stresses that a plant can experience, temperature has the widest and most far-reaching effects on legumes. Temperature extremes, both high (heat stress) and low (cold stress), are injurious to plants at all stages of development, resulting in severe loss of productivity. In response to unfavorable temperatures, plant biomolecules such as stress proteins, enzymatic and non-enzymatic antioxidants, organic osmolytes and phytohormones come into play, usually, as a part of the plant defense mechanisms. The accumulation of these molecules, which may be useful as metabolic indicators of stress tolerance, depend on the plant species exposed to the temperature stress, its intensity and duration. Some of these molecules such as osmolytes, non-enzymatic antioxidants and phytohormones may be supplied exogenously to improve temperature stress tolerance. Legumes show varying degrees of sensitivity to high and low-temperature stresses, which reduces their potential performance at various developmental stages. To address the ever-fluctuating temperature extremes that various legumes are being constantly exposed, efforts are being made to develop tolerant plant varieties via conventional breeding methods as well as more recent molecular breeding techniques. In this review, we describe the progress made towards the adverse effects of abnormal temperatures on various growth stages in legumes and propose appropriate strategies to resolve these effects.

Developing Climate-Resilient Chickpea Involving Physiological and Molecular Approaches With a Focus on Temperature and Drought Stresses

“…Some plant regulating molecules look promising for imparting stress tolerance (Bhandari et al, 2017), and have been investigated in chickpea for enhancing cold tolerance. Polyamines (PAs), with a polycationic nature at a physiological pH, bind strongly to the negative charges in cellular components such as nucleic acids, proteins, and phospholipids (Bouchereau et al, 1999) and interact with membrane phospholipids to stabilize membranes under stress conditions (Roberts et al, 1986).…”

Chickpea Abiotic Stresses: Combating Drought, Heat and Cold

“…Generally, temperature (>30°C) limited yield in cool season legumes such as chickpea, lentil, faba bean and field peas [92][93][94][95]. Plant growth, phenology, biomass accumulation and yield are important agronomic traits which depends on the crop ability to withstand or acclimate under abiotic stress [96].…”

Salinity and High Temperature Tolerance in Mungbean [Vigna radiata (L.) Wilczek] from a Physiological Perspective

“…Typically, their endogenous levels shoot up as plant defense and expression depends on type of plant species exposed, and intensity/duration of the stress. Legumes show varying degrees of sensitivity, which reduces their potential performance at different developmental stages such as germination, seedling emergence, vegetative phase, flowering and pod/seed filling phase ( Bhandari et al, 2016 ). To address ever-fluctuating temperature extremes, efforts are being made in developing tolerant genotypes in legume either by conventional breeding strategies and/or more newly, by molecular breeding methods.…”