The pseudobulb is a storage organ for water and nutrients that plays a crucial role in the growth and survival of epiphytic orchids. However, the role of water and metabolites in pseudobulb during adaptation to environmental stress are rarely detected through control experiments. In the present study, water-related physiological traits and metabolite changes in the pseudobulbs at the flowering stage and full leaf expansion stage for Pleione aurita were investigated after drought stress and recovery treatments. We found that the composition of non-structural carbohydrates (starch vs. soluble sugar) varied over the lifetime of pseudobulbs, and older pseudobulbs stored more water, whereas younger pseudobulbs stored more dry matter. When plants were subjected to drought stress and subsequent recovery, multiple metabolites in the pseudobulbs including non-structural carbohydrates, flavonoids, phenolic acids, as well as amino acids and their derivatives responded positively to these water level fluctuations. For those metabolites that differently accumulated in both stress and recovery processes, old pseudobulbs contained a higher number of these key metabolites than did the connected younger pseudobulbs. In addition, young and old pseudobulbs use different metabolic pathways to both respond and recover to drought. These results indicate that orchid pseudobulbs cope with water level fluctuations by mobilizing metabolite reserves and that pseudobulbs of different ages exhibit different physiological and metabolic responses to drought stress. These findings broadens our understanding of the role pseudobulbs play in the survival of orchids growing in epiphytic habitats.
Keywords: Drought stress; Epiphytic plant; Metabolomics; Physiological integration; Pleione; Pseudobulb.
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