Miller Golan, Beery Avital, Singh Prashant Kumar, Wang Fengde, Zelingher Rotem, Motenko Etel, Lieberman-Lazarovich Michal
Institute of Plant Sciences, Agricultural Research Organization - Volcani Center, Rishon LeZion 7505101, Israel.
Department of Biotechnology, Mizoram University (A Central University), Pachhunga University College Campus, Aizawl 796005, Mizoram, India.
AoB Plants. 2021 Jul 17;13(4):plab046. doi: 10.1093/aobpla/plab046. eCollection 2021 Aug.
Climate change is causing temperature increment in crop production areas worldwide, generating conditions of heat stress that negatively affect crop productivity. Tomato (), a major vegetable crop, is highly susceptible to conditions of heat stress. When tomato plants are exposed to ambient day/night temperatures that exceed 32 °C/20 °C, respectively, during the reproductive phase, fruit set and fruit weight are reduced, leading to a significant decrease in yield. Processing tomato cultivars are cultivated in open fields, where environmental conditions are not controlled; therefore, plants are exposed to multiple abiotic stresses, including heat stress. Nonetheless, information on stress response in processing tomatoes is very limited. Understanding the physiological response of modern processing tomato cultivars to heat stress may facilitate the development of thermotolerant cultivars. Here, we compared two tomato processing cultivars, H4107 and H9780, that we found to be constantly differing in yield performance. Using field and temperature-controlled greenhouse experiments, we show that the observed difference in yield is attributed to the occurrence of heat stress conditions. In addition, fruit set and seed production were significantly higher in the thermotolerant cultivar H4107, compared with H9780. Despite the general acceptance of pollen viability as a measure of thermotolerance, there was no difference in the percentage of viable pollen between H4107 and H9780 under either of the conditions tested. In addition to observations of similar pollen germination and bud abscission rates, our results suggest that processing tomato cultivars may present a particular case, in which pollen performance is not determining reproductive thermotolerance. Our results also demonstrate the value of combining controlled and uncontrolled experimental settings, in order to validate and identify heat stress-related responses, thus facilitating the development of thermotolerant processing tomato cultivars.
气候变化正在导致全球农作物种植区气温上升，产生热应激条件，对作物生产力产生负面影响。番茄（）作为一种主要蔬菜作物，对热应激条件高度敏感。在生殖阶段，当番茄植株分别暴露于白天/夜间环境温度超过32°C/20°C时，坐果率和果实重量会降低，导致产量显著下降。加工番茄品种在露天田地种植，环境条件不受控制；因此，植株会受到包括热应激在内的多种非生物胁迫。尽管如此，关于加工番茄应激反应的信息非常有限。了解现代加工番茄品种对热应激的生理反应可能有助于培育耐热品种。在这里，我们比较了两个番茄加工品种H4107和H9780，我们发现它们在产量表现上一直存在差异。通过田间和温控温室实验，我们表明观察到的产量差异归因于热应激条件的出现。此外，与H9780相比，耐热品种H4107的坐果率和种子产量显著更高。尽管花粉活力通常被认为是耐热性的一个指标，但在测试的任何一种条件下，H4107和H9780之间的有活力花粉百分比没有差异。除了观察到相似的花粉萌发率和花蕾脱落率外，我们的结果表明加工番茄品种可能是一个特殊情况，其中花粉表现并非决定生殖耐热性的因素。我们的结果还证明了结合受控和非受控实验设置的价值，以验证和识别与热应激相关的反应，从而促进耐热加工番茄品种的培育。
