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Environment Stress Tolerance in Plant-Physiological Aspects

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Augmenting Crop Productivity in Stress Environment

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Abstract

Plants are often exposed to various environmental stresses (ES) such as drought (deficit in precipitation), salinity, high and low temperatures, and high light intensity under both natural and agricultural conditions. These ES significantly affect the growth of the plants, metabolism, and productivity worldwide. Many plants have improved their resistance mechanisms by involving numerous physiological reactions to tolerate ES, but these mechanisms are varied and depend on plant species. Plant responses to environmental constraints depend on the length and severity of the ES and the plant species, age, and developmental stage. Plants possess a number of adaptive, avoidance, or acclimation mechanisms to cope with these ES situations. In addition, major tolerance mechanisms that employ osmoprotectants, proteins, antioxidants, ion transporters, and other factors involved in signaling cascades and transcriptional control are activated to offset stress-induced and physiological and biochemical alterations. Plant survival under environmental stresses depends on the ability to perceive the ES stimulus, generate and transmit the signal, and initiate appropriate physiological and biochemical changes. All ES-induced gene expression and metabolite synthesis also substantially improve tolerance. The physiological and biochemical responses to all kinds of environmental stresses are active research areas. This chapter reviews the recent findings on responses, adaptation, and tolerance to environmental stresses at the cellular, organelles, and whole plant levels and describes various approaches being taken to enhance environment stress tolerance in plants.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ecole Nationale Supérieure Agronomique (ENSA), Département de Productions Végétales, Laboratoire “Amélioration intégrative des productions végétales”, El Harrach, Alger, Algeria

    Sihem Tellah

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  1. Sihem Tellah
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Correspondence to Sihem Tellah .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Forest Productivity, Ranchi, Jharkhand, India

    Shamim Akhtar Ansari

  2. Department of Botany, University of Lucknow, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, India

    Mohammad Israil Ansari

  3. Wolaita Sodo University, Wolaita, Ethiopia

    Azamal Husen

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Tellah, S. (2022). Environment Stress Tolerance in Plant-Physiological Aspects. In: Ansari, S.A., Ansari, M.I., Husen, A. (eds) Augmenting Crop Productivity in Stress Environment. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-6361-1_8

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