Water-use efficiency and drought tolerance in Lycopersicon esculentum and L. pennellii and their F sub 2 crosses

Conference · Wed May 01 00:00:00 EDT 1991 · Plant Physiology, Supplement; (United States)

OSTI ID:5514062

de Soyza, A G; Kay, L E; Gutschick, V P; Maxwell, C ^[1]

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1. New Mexico State Univ., Las Cruces (United States)

In growth chamber experiments the authors compared the water-use efficiency (WUE) and drought tolerance (DT - retention of dry mass vegetative yield when droughted) of the drought intolerant common tomato, L. esculentum and the ostensibly drought tolerant tomato, L. pennellii. Drought treatment was imposed as two severe episodes of drought, each episode lasting until all leaves on the plant were silted, with a period of recovery between treatments. They measured up to 20 performance attributes to WUE and DT, including: root:shoot ratio, leaf internal CO2/ambient CO2, {delta}{sup 13}C, leaf photosynthetic rate, specific leaf mass, leaf water potential, leaf osmotic potential, and stomatal density. Water-use efficiency is negatively correlated with drought tolerance; drought tolerance is positively correlated with plants' ability to increase WUE under stress. Few other attributes are correlated with drought tolerance, and some are conspicuous by their absence. They find evidence for substantial genetic linkage among attributes that confer drought tolerance; and interplant rankings in drought tolerance depend strongly upon the type of drought stress experienced (episodic vs. continuous).

• OSTI ID: 5514062
• Report Number(s): CONF-9107184-; CODEN: PPYSA
• Journal Information: Plant Physiology, Supplement; (United States), Vol. 96:1; Conference: Annual meeting of the American Society of Plant Physiology, Albuquerque, NM (United States), 28 Jul - 1 Aug 1991; ISSN 0079-2241
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
DROUGHTS
ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS
PLANTS
BIOLOGICAL STRESS
PHYSIOLOGY
EXPOSURE CHAMBERS
OSMOSIS
PHOTOSYNTHESIS
PLANT GROWTH
STOMATA
TOLERANCE
TOMATOES
CHEMICAL REACTIONS
DIFFUSION
FOOD
FRUITS
GROWTH
OPENINGS
PHOTOCHEMICAL REACTIONS
SYNTHESIS
551000* - Physiological Systems
540210 - Environment
Terrestrial- Basic Studies- (1990-)