Frost Injury and Heterogeneous Ice Nucleation in Leaves of Tuber-Bearing Solanum Species

Abstract

The heterogeneous ice nucleation characteristics and frost injury in supercooled leaves upon ice formation were studied in nonhardened and cold-hardened species and crosses of tuber-bearing Solanum. The ice nucleation activity of the leaves was low at temperatures just below 0 degrees C and further decreased as a result of cold acclimation. In the absence of supercooling, the nonhardened and cold-hardened leaves tolerated extracellular freezing between -3.5 degrees and -8.5 degrees C. However, if ice initiation in the supercooled leaves occurred at any temperature below -2.6 degrees C, the leaves were lethally injured.To prevent supercooling in these leaves, various nucleants were tested for their ice nucleating ability. One% aqueous suspensions of fluorophlogopite and acetoacetanilide were found to be effective in ice nucleation of the Solanum leaves above -1 degrees C. They had threshold temperatures of -0.7 degrees and -0.8 degrees C, respectively, for freezing in distilled H(2)O. Although freezing could be initiated in the Solanum leaves above -1 degrees C with both the nucleants, 1% aqueous fluorophlogopite suspension showed overall higher ice nucleation activity than acetoacetanilide and was nontoxic to the leaves. The cold-hardened leaves survived between -2.5 degrees and -6.5 degrees using 1% aqueous fluorophlogopite suspension as a nucleant. The killing temperatures in the cold-hardened leaves were similar to those determined using ice as a nucleant. However, in the nonhardened leaves, use of fluorophlogopite as a nucleant resulted in lethal injury at higher temperatures than those estimated using ice as a nucleant.