Morphological and Physiological Alteration of Five Potato Cultivars in Response to Nitrogen Deficiency

• Published in: Russian journal of plant physiology Vol. 70; no. 6
• Main Authors: Hajibarat, Z., Saidi, A., Zeinalabedini, M., Ghaffari, M. R.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Moscow Pleiades Publishing 01.12.2023; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Anthocyanins; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Chlorophyll; Cultivars; Dry weight; Food quality; Gene expression; Genes; Leaves; Life Sciences; Morphology; Nitrogen; Physiology; Plant growth; Plant Physiology; Plant Sciences; Plants (botany); Potatoes; Research Papers; Seedlings; Stems; Vegetables; nitrate transporter; potato; low nitrogen; seedling; nitrogen uptake
• ISSN: 1021-4437; 1608-3407
• DOI: 10.1134/S1021443723601416

Nitrogen is one of the most imperative elements in enhancing yield and improving food quality by playing key roles in biochemical and physiological functions of plants. Developing cultivars with high nitrogen consumption efficiency can be obtained by examining the response of plant growth and nitrogen absorption under low nitrogen (N) content. In the current study, five potato ( Solanum tuberosum L.) cultivars were subjected to Hoagland culture with low N supply, and morphological, physiological traits, and expression levels of the potential genes involved in nitrate uptake were measured at seedling stage. The findings showed that plant growth and physiological traits were differentially influenced by N deficiency in all tested potato cultivars. The seedlings that had high dry weight shoot also maintained high level of stem chlorophyll content under N deficiency. Further, the modification in the stem dry weight revealed close positive correlations with the chlorophyll a / b stem, total chlorophyll stem, carotenoid stem, and anthocyanin root content alterations in response to N-deficient condition. These results demonstrated that beside the stem chlorophyll content, the leaf chlorophyll content may also contribute to N-deficiency adaptation, thus could be considered as an efficient indicator for assessment of diverse response in potato seedlings under N-deficient condition. In addition, our finding showed that under low-N condition, the ‘Sante’ cultivar had higher plant growth indices, chlorophyll content, and anthocyanin root than the other four cultivars (‘Agria’, ‘Balaton’, ‘Javid’, and ‘Jelly’). Among the five cultivars, ‘Sante’ showed higher expression of StNRT1.2 gene than StNRT1.1, StNRT1-.5, and StNRT1.11 genes in leaves, root, and stem under low-N stress. Taken together, our results suggested that the larger chlorophyll content and the up-regulation of nitrate transporter in stem and assimilation genes may contribute to stronger N uptake capacity for plant growth and N accumulation in response to long-term low-N stress. These findings may aid in better understanding of the mechanism of low N tolerance and as a result lead to developing potato cultivars with high-NUE.