Phosphorous Supplementation Alleviates Drought-Induced Physio-Biochemical Damages in <i>Calligonum mongolicum</i>
Abd Ullah,
Akash Tariq,
Fanjiang Zeng,
Jordi Sardans,
Corina Graciano,
Sami Ullah,
Xutian Chai,
Zhihao Zhang,
Maierdang Keyimu,
Muhammad Ahsan Asghar,
Hafiz Hassan Javed,
Josep Peñuelas
Affiliations
Abd Ullah
Xinjiang Key Desert Plant Roots Ecology and Vegetation Restoration Laboratory, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi 830000, China
Akash Tariq
Xinjiang Key Desert Plant Roots Ecology and Vegetation Restoration Laboratory, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi 830000, China
Fanjiang Zeng
Xinjiang Key Desert Plant Roots Ecology and Vegetation Restoration Laboratory, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi 830000, China
Jordi Sardans
CSIC, Global Ecology Unit, CREAF-CSIC-UAB, Bellaterra, 08193 Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain
Corina Graciano
Instituto de Fisiología Vegetal, Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas, Universidad Nacional de La Plata, Buenos Aires B1406, Argentina
Sami Ullah
Department of Botany, University of Peshawar, Peshawar 25000, Pakistan
Xutian Chai
Xinjiang Key Desert Plant Roots Ecology and Vegetation Restoration Laboratory, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi 830000, China
Zhihao Zhang
Xinjiang Key Desert Plant Roots Ecology and Vegetation Restoration Laboratory, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi 830000, China
Maierdang Keyimu
Xinjiang Key Desert Plant Roots Ecology and Vegetation Restoration Laboratory, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi 830000, China
Muhammad Ahsan Asghar
Department of Biological Resources, Agricultural Institute, Centre for Agricultural Research, ELKH, 2462 Martonvásár, Hungary
Hafiz Hassan Javed
College of Agronomy, Sichuan Agricultural University, Chengdu 611130, China
Josep Peñuelas
CSIC, Global Ecology Unit, CREAF-CSIC-UAB, Bellaterra, 08193 Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain
Calligonum mongolicum is a phreatophyte playing an important role in sand dune fixation, but little is known about its responses to drought and P fertilization. In the present study, we performed a pot experiment to investigate the effects of P fertilization under drought or well-watered conditions on multiple morpho-physio-biochemical attributes of C. mongolicum seedlings. Drought stress leads to a higher production of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) and malondialdehyde (MDA), leading to impaired growth and metabolism. However, C. mongolicum exhibited effective drought tolerance strategies, including a higher accumulation of soluble sugars, starch, soluble protein, proline, and significantly higheractivities of peroxidase (POD) and catalase (CAT) enzymes. P fertilization increased the productivity of drought-stressed seedlings by increasing their growth, assimilative shoots relative water content, photosynthetic pigments, osmolytes accumulation, mineral nutrition, N assimilation, and reduced lipid peroxidation. Our findings suggest the presence of soil high P depletion and C. mongolicum high P requirements during the initial growth stage. Thus, P can be utilized as a fertilizer to enhance the growth and productivity of Calligonum vegetation and to reduce the fragility of the hyper-arid desert of Taklamakan in the context of future climate change.
