Mycorrhizal fungi reduce the photosystem damage caused by drought stress on Paris polyphylla var. yunnanensis

Can Huang; Xiahong He; Rui Shi; Shuhui Zi; Congfang Xi; Xiaoxian Li; Tao Liu

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0294394

Mycorrhizal fungi reduce the photosystem damage caused by drought stress on Paris polyphylla var. yunnanensis

PLoS One. 2024 Apr 18;19(4):e0294394. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0294394. eCollection 2024.

Authors

Can Huang^{1

2

3}, Xiahong He⁴, Rui Shi⁴, Shuhui Zi^{1

2}, Congfang Xi¹, Xiaoxian Li⁵, Tao Liu^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Yunnan Agricultural University, Kunming, China.
² State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China.
³ Guangxi Subtropical Crops Research Institute, Nanning, China.
⁴ Southwest Forestry University, Kunming, China.
⁵ Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China.

Abstract

Drought stress (DS) is one of the important abiotic stresses facing cash crops today. Drought can reduce plant growth and development, inhibit photosynthesis, and thus reduce plant yield. In this experiment, we investigated the protective mechanism of AMF on plant photosynthetic system by inoculating Paris polyphylla var. yunnanensis(P.py) with a clumping mycorrhizal fungus (AMF) under drought conditions. The drought environment was maintained by weighing AMF plants and non-AMF plants. The relative water content (RWC) of plant leaves was measured to determine its drought effect. DS decreased the RWC of plants, but AMF was able to increase the RWC of plants. chlorophyll a fluorescence curve measurements revealed that DS increased the OKJIP curve of plants, but AMF was able to reduce this trend, indicating that AMF increased the light absorption capacity of plants. DS also caused a decrease in plant Y(I) and Y(II). ETRI and ETRII, and increased Y(NO) and Y(NA) in plants, indicating that DS caused photosystem damage in plants. For the same host, different AMFs did not help to the same extent, but all AMFs were able to help plants reduce this damage and contribute to the increase of plant photosynthesis under normal water conditions.

Copyright: © 2024 Huang et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

MeSH terms

Chlorophyll A
Droughts
Liliaceae*
Mycorrhizae*
Water

Substances

Chlorophyll A
Water

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the Key R & D program of Yunnan Province, China (grant no. 202103AC100003; 202101AS070228); Major special projects of the Ministry of science and technology (2021YFD1000202); the National Nature Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 31860075); the Project of the Service Center for Overseas Professionals of Yunnan Association for Science and Technology(Grant No. SW202300023);Key projects of Yunnan provincial natural fund(202201AS070064).