Phenotyping Root Systems in a Set of Japonica Rice Accessions: Can Structural Traits Predict the Response to Drought?
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ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Open Access
Phenotyping Root Systems in a Set of Japonica Rice Accessions: Can Structural Traits Predict the Response to Drought? Paulo Henrique Ramos Guimarães1* , Isabela Pereira de Lima2, Adriano Pereira de Castro 1, Anna Cristina Lanna1, Patrícia Guimarães Santos Melo3 and Marcel de Raïssac4*
Abstract Background: The root system plays a major role in plant growth and development and root system architecture is reported to be the main trait related to plant adaptation to drought. However, phenotyping root systems in situ is not suited to high-throughput methods, leading to the development of non-destructive methods for evaluations in more or less controlled root environments. This study used a root phenotyping platform with a panel of 20 japonica rice accessions in order to: (i) assess their genetic diversity for a set of structural and morphological root traits and classify the different types; (ii) analyze the plastic response of their root system to a water deficit at reproductive phase and (iii) explore the ability of the platform for high-throughput phenotyping of root structure and morphology. Results: High variability for the studied root traits was found in the reduced set of accessions. Using eight selected traits under irrigated conditions, five root clusters were found that differed in root thickness, branching index and the pattern of fine and thick root distribution along the profile. When water deficit occurred at reproductive phase, some accessions significantly reduced root growth compared to the irrigated treatment, while others stimulated it. It was found that root cluster, as defined under irrigated conditions, could not predict the plastic response of roots under drought. Conclusions: This study revealed the possibility of reconstructing the structure of root systems from scanned images. It was thus possible to significantly class root systems according to simple structural traits, opening up the way for using such a platform for medium to high-throughput phenotyping. The study also highlighted the uncoupling between root structures under non-limiting water conditions and their response to drought. Keywords: Oryza sativa, Root system architecture, PVC pipes, Genetic variation, Phenotypic plasticity
Background The root system plays a major role in whole plant growth and development: it is the well-known “hidden half”, as described by Eshel and Beeckman (2013). Roots are directly involved in plant health, growth and survival, through water * Correspondence: [email protected]; [email protected] 1 Embrapa Arroz e Feijão, Rodovia GO-462, km 12, Santo Antônio de Goiás, GO 75375-000, Brazil 4 Univ Montpellier, CIRAD, INRA, Montpellier SupAgro, AGAP, Montpellier France Full list of author information is available at the end of the article
and nutrient uptake (Zhu et al. 2011; Takehisa et al. 2012; Sozzani and Iyer-Pascuzzi 2014). They are also the place where hormone synthesis and consumption take place, acting on whole plant hormonal regulation (Zhang et al. 2
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