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Dissecting physiological traits for drought and heat tolerance in wheat

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Abstract

Intergovernmental panel on climate change has predicted a 1.5 °C increase in temperature and a 4–27% decrease in precipitation in the next decade. Drought and heat cause 60% and 40% wheat yield losses by altering the physiology of the crop. Understanding the impact of these stresses on wheat physiological traits can help in developing tolerant genotypes. Forty-two genotypes were evaluated under non-stress (TSIR-NS), drought (TSRF-DR), and heat stress (LSIR-HT) for two crop seasons. The experiments were laid in rectangular lattice (6 × 7) design with two replications. Data for grain yield and various physiological traits were recorded at GS70 and GS75. Grain yield (GY) was reduced by 29.0%, 16.4% under heat, and by 48.7% and 30.2% under drought stress during the two seasons. Heat susceptibility index (HSI) and drought susceptibility index (DSI) of these genotypes ranged from 0.3 to 1.8 and 0.4 to 1.4. Among the top five high-yielding lines under TSIR-NS, only one (G39) was drought tolerant, while under LSIR-HT, four high-yielding lines (G40, G41, G04, and G35) of the top five genotypes were heat tolerant. Conversely, the top five high-yielding lines under TSRF-DR were drought tolerant. Overall, 21 lines were tolerant to heat stress and 22 to drought and 12 genotypes were tolerant to both stresses. Chlorophyll was higher under LSIR-HT and TSRF-DR. Normalized difference vegetation index at GS70 (NDVIA) and normalized difference vegetation index at GS75 (NDVI15DAA) suffered a drastic reduction under TSRF-DR. The stomatal conductance (gs) and transpiration (E) were greatly reduced under drought and increased under LSIR-HT. Assimilation (A) and photosynthetic water use efficiency (WUE) were reduced under heat stress. The correlation of physiological traits with GY was also calculated. The traits chlorophyll fluorescence at GS70 (CFLA), NDVI 15DAA, and E contributed toward GY under TSIR-NS, CFLA, NDVI15DAA, WUE, Canopy temperature at GS75 (CT15DAA), and gs under TSRF-DR, and A, NDVIA, CFLA, and chlorophyll fluorescence at GS75 (CFL15DAA) under LSIR-HT. CFLA contributed toward GY under all environments. Finally, traits such as A, E, WUE, and CFL15DAA were impacted by both stresses, while NDVIA and NDVI15DAA and gs were only affected by drought and CFLA and CTA were only influenced by heat stress.

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Abbreviations

TSIR-NS:

Non-stress

TSRF-DR:

Drought stress

LSIR-HT:

Heat stress conditions

GY:

Grain yield

TGW:

1000 Grain weight

CFLA:

Chlorophyll fluorescence at GS70

CFL15DAA:

Chlorophyll fluorescence at GS75

CHLA:

Chlorophyll at GS70

CHL15DAA:

Chlorophyll at GS75

CTA:

Canopy temperature at GS70

CT15DAA:

Canopy temperature at GS75

NDVIA:

Normalized difference vegetation index at GS70

NDVI15DAA:

Normalized difference vegetation index at GS75

Ci:

Sub-stomatal CO2 concentration

gs:

Stomata conductance

A:

Assimilation rate

E:

Transpiration

WUE:

Photosynthetic water use efficiency

RUE:

Photosynthetic radiation use efficiency

HSI:

Heat susceptibility index

DSI:

Drought susceptibility index

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Acknowledgements

Financial support for the period (2015–2020) from the Indian Council of Agricultural Research under Strategic Research Component of NICRA (National Innovations in Climate Resilient Agriculture) project (1006534) to conduct the study is acknowledged.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. ICAR-Indian Institute of Wheat and Barley Research, Karnal, Haryana, India

    Sindhu Sareen & B. K. Meena

  2. CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar, Haryana, India

    Ashok Sarial

  3. ICAR-National Bureau of Plant Genetic Resources, New Delhi, India

    Sundeep Kumar

Authors
  1. Sindhu Sareen
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  2. B. K. Meena
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  3. Ashok Sarial
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  4. Sundeep Kumar
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Contributions

SS contributed to conceptualization, formal analysis, funding acquisition, and writing—original draft; SS and BKM were involved in investigation; and SS, AKS, and SK contributed to writing—review and editing.

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Correspondence to Sindhu Sareen.

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The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Communicated by Ahmad Mohammad Alqudah.

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Sareen, S., Meena, B.K., Sarial, A. et al. Dissecting physiological traits for drought and heat tolerance in wheat. CEREAL RESEARCH COMMUNICATIONS (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42976-023-00463-6

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