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Influence of arbuscular mycorrhiza on organic solutes in maize leaves under salt stress

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Abstract

A pot experiment was conducted to examine the effect of the arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungus, Glomus mosseae, on plant biomass and organic solute accumulation in maize leaves. Maize plants were grown in sand and soil mixture with three NaCl levels (0, 0.5, and 1.0 g kg−1 dry substrate) for 55 days, after 15 days of establishment under non-saline conditions. At all salinity levels, mycorrhizal plants had higher biomass and higher accumulation of organic solutes in leaves, which were dominated by soluble sugars, reducing sugars, soluble protein, and organic acids in both mycorrhizal and non-mycorrhizal plants. The relative abundance of free amino acids and proline in total organic solutes was lower in mycorrhizal than in non-mycorrhizal plants, while that of reducing sugars was higher. In addition, the AM symbiosis raised the concentrations of soluble sugars, reducing sugars, soluble protein, total organic acids, oxalic acid, fumaric acid, acetic acid, malic acid, and citric acid and decreased the concentrations of total free amino acids, proline, formic acid, and succinic acid in maize leaves. In mycorrhizal plants, the dominant organic acid was oxalic acid, while in non-mycorrhizal plants, the dominant organic acid was succinic acid. All the results presented here indicate that the accumulation of organic solutes in leaves is a specific physiological response of maize plants to the AM symbiosis, which could mitigate the negative impact of soil salinity on plant productivity.

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Acknowledgments

The study was supported by the Key Project of National Natural Science Foundation of China (30630054), the Program for Changjiang Scholars and Innovative Research Team in University of China (IRT0748), and the Ph.D. Program Foundation of Ministry of Education of China (20100204110033). We are indebted to Chantal Hamel, Semiarid Prairie Agricultural Research Centre, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, for editing this article.

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  1. College of Life Science, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, Shaanxi, 712100, China

    Min Sheng & Yanhui Huang

  2. College of Forestry, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, Shaanxi, 712100, China

    Ming Tang & Fengfeng Zhang

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  1. Min Sheng
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  2. Ming Tang
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  3. Fengfeng Zhang
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  4. Yanhui Huang
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Correspondence to Ming Tang.

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Sheng, M., Tang, M., Zhang, F. et al. Influence of arbuscular mycorrhiza on organic solutes in maize leaves under salt stress. Mycorrhiza 21, 423–430 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00572-010-0353-z

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