Rate of Drying Influences Tolerance of Low Water Contents in the Moss Funaria hygrometrica (Funariaceae)

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

6-17-2019

Publication Title

Bryologist

Volume

122

Issue

2

First page number:

271

Last page number:

280

Abstract

Desiccation tolerance (DT) in poikilohydric organisms is dependent upon four principal sequential factors, (1) the rate of drying (RoD), (2) the water content (WC) of the organism deriving from the equilibrating relative humidity (RHeq), (3) the duration of the desiccation event, and (4) the rate of rehydration (RoR). The first two factors are often combined in experiments as the “intensity” of desiccation, and thus the effect of one on the other is relatively unknown but likely to be important ecologically. We hypothesized that more protracted rates of drying should mitigate damage at lower equilibrating RHs in a known inducibly DT species. Cultured uniclonal shoots of the moss Funaria hygrometrica were dried at different RoDs (time from full turgor to leaf curling, from 0.067 to 120 h) at five different RHs (12, 33, 54, 75 and 93%), allowed to equilibrate at each RH, rehydrated and assessed using chlorophyll fluorescence at 0.5 and 24 h postrehydration. At 24 h postrehydration, shoots of F. hygrometrica subjected to a rapid-dry event... (see full abstract in article).

Keywords

Equilibrating relative humidity; Constitutive; Inducible; Suprasaturation; Chlorophyll fluorescence; Bryophyta

Disciplines

Bryology

Language

English

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