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Roots: The Acquisition of Water and Nutrients from the Heterogeneous Soil Environment

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Progress in Botany 71

Part of the book series: Progress in Botany ((BOTANY,volume 71))

Abstract

The distribution of water and nutrient resources in soil is heterogeneous. Plant roots have to cope with, and exploit, this heterogeneity in resource supply to acquire these two key resources. Here, the responses by roots including rooting depth, root demography, morphological and physiological plasticity to heterogeneous supplies of water and nutrients will be reviewed and their ecological consequences discussed. How roots themselves influence water distribution through the process of hydraulic redistribution and the ecological consequences of this process, including the impact on nutrient availability, will also be examined.

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Acknowledgements

I thank Alastair Fitter, David Eissenstat and an anonymous reviewer for comments on the manuscript.

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  1. Department of Biology, University of York, Area 14, 373, York, YO10 5YW, UK

    Angela Hodge

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  1. Inst. Botanik, TU Darmstadt, Schnittspahnstr. 3-5, Darmstadt, 64287, Germany

    Ulrich Lüttge

  2. Fakultät für Biologie, LS für Experimentelle Ökologie, Universität Bielefeld, Bielefeld, Germany

    Wolfram Beyschlag

  3. FB Biologie, Abt. Allgemeine Botanik, TU Kaiserslautern, Erwin-Schrödinger-Str., Kaiserslautern, 67663, Germany

    Burkhard Büdel

  4. Cardiff School of Biosciences, University of Cardiff, Cardiff, United Kingdom

    Dennis Francis

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Hodge, A. (2010). Roots: The Acquisition of Water and Nutrients from the Heterogeneous Soil Environment. In: Lüttge, U., Beyschlag, W., Büdel, B., Francis, D. (eds) Progress in Botany 71. Progress in Botany, vol 71. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-02167-1_12

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