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Nitrogen deposition limits photosynthetic response to elevated CO2 differentially in a dioecious species

  • Physiological ecology - Original Paper
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Abstract

Sexual dimorphisms of dioecious plants are important in controlling and maintaining sex ratios under changing climate environments. Yet, little is known about sex-specific responses to elevated CO2 with soil nitrogen (N) deposition. To investigate sex-related physiological and biochemical responses to elevated CO2 with N deposition, Populus cathayana Rehd. was employed as a model species. The cuttings were subjected to two CO2 regimes (350 and 700 μmol mol−1) with two N levels (0 and 5 g N m−2 year−1). Our results showed that elevated CO2 and N deposition separately increased the total number of leaves, leaf area (LA), leaf mass, net photosynthetic rate (P n), light saturated photosynthetic rate (P max), chlorophyll a (Chl a), and chlorophyll a to chlorophyll b ratio (Chl a/b) in both males and females of P. cathayana. However, the effects on LA, leaf mass, P n, P max, Chl a and Chl a/b were weakened under the combined treatment of elevated CO2 and N deposition. Males had higher leaf mass, P n, P max, apparent quantum yield (Φ), carboxylation efficiency (CE), Chl a, Chl a/b, leaf N, and root carbon to N ratio (C/N) than did females under elevated CO2 with N deposition. In contrast to males, females had significantly higher levels of soluble sugars in leaves and greater starch accumulation in roots and stems under the same condition. The results of the present work imply that P. cathayana females are more responsive and suffer from greater negative effects on growth and photosynthetic capacity than do males when grown under elevated CO2 with soil N deposition.

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Acknowledgments

The research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 30771721, 30930075), and the Program of “Knowledge Innovation Engineering” of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (No. KSCX2-YW-Z-1019).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Chengdu Institute of Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, P.O. Box 416, Chengdu, 610041, China

    Hongxia Zhao, Yuanbin Zhang & Chunyang Li

  2. Graduate School of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100039, China

    Hongxia Zhao

  3. College of Life Science, China West Normal University, Nanchong, 637002, China

    Xiao Xu

  4. Department of Agricultural Sciences, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 27, 00014, Helsinki, Finland

    Helena Korpelainen

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  1. Hongxia Zhao
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  2. Xiao Xu
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  3. Yuanbin Zhang
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Correspondence to Chunyang Li.

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Communicated by Andrea Polle.

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Zhao, H., Xu, X., Zhang, Y. et al. Nitrogen deposition limits photosynthetic response to elevated CO2 differentially in a dioecious species. Oecologia 165, 41–54 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00442-010-1763-5

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