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Important photosynthetic contribution from the non-foliar green organs in cotton at the late growth stage

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Abstract

Non-foliar green organs are recognized as important carbon sources after leaves. However, the contribution of each organ to total yield has not been comprehensively studied in relation to the time-course of changes in surface area and photosynthetic activity of different organs at different growth stages. We studied the contribution of leaves, main stem, bracts and capsule wall in cotton by measuring their time-course of surface area development, O2 evolution capacity and photosynthetic enzyme activity. Because of the early senescence of leaves, non-foliar organs increased their surface area up to 38.2% of total at late growth stage. Bracts and capsule wall showed less ontogenetic decrease in O2 evolution capacity per area and photosynthetic enzyme activity than leaves at the late growth stage. The total capacity for O2 evolution of stalks and bolls (bracts plus capsule wall) was 12.7 and 23.7% (total ca. 36.4%), respectively, as estimated by multiplying their surface area by their O2 evolution capacity per area. We also kept the bolls (from 15 days after anthesis) or main stem (at the early full bolling stage) in darkness for comparison with non-darkened controls. Darkening the bolls and main stem reduced the boll weight by 24.1 and 9%, respectively, and the seed weight by 35.9 and 16.3%, respectively. We conclude that non-foliar organs significantly contribute to the yield at the late growth stage.

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Abbreviations

ATP:

Adenosine triphosphate

Chl:

Chlorophyll

DAA:

Days after anthesis

DTT:

Dithiothreitol

EDTA:

Ethylenediaminetetraacetate

MDH:

Malate dehydrogenase

NADH:

Reduced nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide

NADPH:

Reduced nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate

PEPC:

Phosphoenolpyruvate carboxylase

RuBPC:

Ribulose 1,5-bisphosphate carboxylase

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Acknowledgments

We thank XP Yi, XJ Zhang, T Liu, MS Yang and XB Hu for their support in plant culture and experiment and Jan Anderson for her helpful comments on the manuscript. This study was financially supported by a China Scholarship Council fellowship, the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 31060176), the Special Launching Funds for High-level Talents of Shihezi University (Grant No. RCZX201005), JSPS Postdoctoral Fellowships for Research Abroad (21-674) and by the Australian Research Council (DP1093827).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Key Laboratory of Oasis Eco-agriculture, Xinjiang Production and Construction Group, Shihezi University, Shihezi, 832003, People’s Republic of China

    Yuan-Yuan Hu, Ya-Li Zhang, Hong-Hai Luo, Wei Li & Wang-Feng Zhang

  2. Division of Plant Science, Research School of Biology, College of Medicine, Biology and Environment, The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, 0200, Australia

    Riichi Oguchi & Wah Soon Chow

  3. State Key Laboratory of Vegetation and Environment, Institute of Botany, The Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100093, People’s of China

    Da-Yong Fan

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  1. Yuan-Yuan Hu
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Correspondence to Wang-Feng Zhang.

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Hu, YY., Zhang, YL., Luo, HH. et al. Important photosynthetic contribution from the non-foliar green organs in cotton at the late growth stage. Planta 235, 325–336 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00425-011-1511-z

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