Abstract
Brown root rot, caused by infection of the basidiomycete Phellinus noxius (Corner) G. Cunn., threatens many tree species in forests, orchards, and plantations of tropical regions. However, the precise physiological impairment of the trees with disease progression remains inadequately understood. Here, we chronicle the root decay, water relation, and physiological traits of leaves using artificially inoculated seedlings of two tree species of different leafing habits, semi-deciduous Bischofia javanica Blume and evergreen Rhaphiolepis umbellata (Thunb.) Makino. Stomatal closure seemed to be the primary reaction, without either species exhibiting a decrease in root hydraulic conductance associated with hyphae invasion or change in stem water potential. Compared with R. umbellata, B. javanica with highly sensitive stomatal response, alleviated the deterioration in carboxylation from hyphae invasion by thermal dissipation of excessive energy. These physiological responses were detected earlier than the appearance of visible disease symptoms. Although there were some differences in chlorophyll fluorescence (ChlF) response between the two species, our results have demonstrated that decreases in stomatal conductance and changes in ChlF, possibly depending on the species' leafing habit are some of the initial physiological responses of trees during the early phase of brown root rot infection.
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Data Availability
The datasets generated and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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Acknowledgements
We thank Dr Y. Takahashi and Dr M. Komatsu of the Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute for the observation of pathogen hyphae by fluorescence microscopy, Ms. M. Ishikawa for the preparation and propagation of seedlings, and Prof. E. Maruta of Kanagawa University for the measurement of stomatal conductance. We also appreciate the valuable comments given by Dr M. Kitao and Dr H. Tobita of the Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute helped improve the overall quality of this manuscript.
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This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI grant no. JP16H04948, 21H02241 and 21H02225.
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YK: experimental design, conducting experimental procedures, analysis, and writing the manuscript. FK: conducting physiological measurement, and analysis of root morphologies. ZC: conducting microscopy observations. DL: review of analyses and writing the manuscript. AM: incubating and inoculating pathogens. SS-T and IA: experimental design and measurement of root hydraulic conductance. KM, TY, and SH: measurement of the content of ABA. MY and OY: experimental design. SN: experimental design, incubating and inoculating pathogens, writing the manuscript. YK and FK should be considered joint first authors.
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Kenichi Yazaki and Fuku S. Kimura contributed equally to this study and both are first authors.
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Yazaki, K., Kimura, F.S., Zhang, C. et al. Physiological responses of seedlings to the invasion of brown root rot hyphae differ between semi-deciduous Bischofia javanica Blume and evergreen Rhaphiolepis umbellata (Thunb.) Makino. Eur J Plant Pathol 168, 147–166 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10658-023-02740-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10658-023-02740-w