Ways That Plants Cope with Saline Environments
Ways that plants cope with saline environments
Introduction
There are a lot of plants in this world managed to grow in different kind of environments by adapting to those environments in certain ways. In this essay, plants grow in environment with different salinity are concerned. Plants can be divided into two different groups when it comes to salinity. The first type of plants is the plants that grow and reproduce in saline environment which are called halophytes (Jefferies. 1981). Whereas glycophytes are those plants growing in nonsaline soils (Jefferies. 1981). A saline environment refers to an environment that has high concentration of salt. Sodium chloride often is the dominant salt which present at a concentration of approximately 0.5M in seawater (Jefferies. 1981). There are also other salts such as Na2SO4, MgSO4, CaSO4, MgCl2, KCl, and Na2CO3 may also present in seawater (Jefferies. 1981). The aim of this paper is to investigate the ways of halophytes cope with saline environments which allows them to survive in it.
Effects of saline environment
According to Binzel (1988) (cited by Niu et al. 1995), when plant cells are exposed to salinity, mediated by high concentration of NaCl, kinetic steady states of ion transport for Na+ and Cl- and other ion, such as K+ and Ca2+, are disturbed. High apoplastic levels of Na+ and Cl- alter aqueous and ionic thermodynamic equilibria and therefore resulting in hyperosmotic stress, ionic imbalance, and toxicity (Niu et al. 1995). Besides that, accumulation of salt in the apoplast would also gradually increase the osmotic gradient between inside and outside of the cell (Volkmar et al. 1998). As a result, water inside the call would move outward into the intercellular spaces in order to achieve a thermodynamic equilibrium, leading to progressive cellular dehydration and, eventually, cell death (Volkmar et al. 1998).
Salinity environment affects different parts of the plant. As an example, by McCree (1986)
Introduction
There are a lot of plants in this world managed to grow in different kind of environments by adapting to those environments in certain ways. In this essay, plants grow in environment with different salinity are concerned. Plants can be divided into two different groups when it comes to salinity. The first type of plants is the plants that grow and reproduce in saline environment which are called halophytes (Jefferies. 1981). Whereas glycophytes are those plants growing in nonsaline soils (Jefferies. 1981). A saline environment refers to an environment that has high concentration of salt. Sodium chloride often is the dominant salt which present at a concentration of approximately 0.5M in seawater (Jefferies. 1981). There are also other salts such as Na2SO4, MgSO4, CaSO4, MgCl2, KCl, and Na2CO3 may also present in seawater (Jefferies. 1981). The aim of this paper is to investigate the ways of halophytes cope with saline environments which allows them to survive in it.
Effects of saline environment
According to Binzel (1988) (cited by Niu et al. 1995), when plant cells are exposed to salinity, mediated by high concentration of NaCl, kinetic steady states of ion transport for Na+ and Cl- and other ion, such as K+ and Ca2+, are disturbed. High apoplastic levels of Na+ and Cl- alter aqueous and ionic thermodynamic equilibria and therefore resulting in hyperosmotic stress, ionic imbalance, and toxicity (Niu et al. 1995). Besides that, accumulation of salt in the apoplast would also gradually increase the osmotic gradient between inside and outside of the cell (Volkmar et al. 1998). As a result, water inside the call would move outward into the intercellular spaces in order to achieve a thermodynamic equilibrium, leading to progressive cellular dehydration and, eventually, cell death (Volkmar et al. 1998).
Salinity environment affects different parts of the plant. As an example, by McCree (1986)
References: Bohnert, H. J., Nelson, D. E., Jensen, R. G. (1995) Adaptations to Environmental Stress. The Plant Cell. 7, 1099-1111. Jefferies, R. J. (1981) Osmotic Adjustment and the Response of Halophytic Plants to Salinity. BioScience. 31, 42-46. Niu, X., Bressan, R. A., Hasegawa, P. M., Pardo, J. M. (1995) Ion Homeostasis in NaCl Stress Environments. Plant Physiol. 109, 735-742 Volkmar, K.M., Hu, Y., Steppuhn, H. (1998) Physiological responses of plants to salinity: A review. Can. J. Plant Sci. 78, 19-27. Wikipedia (2006) Osmosis. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. [excess on 25 of April 2006] Wikipedia (2006) Polyol. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. [excess on 25 of April 2006]