Abstract
The source-sink relationship determines crop yield, and it is largely regulated by water and nutrients in agricultural production. This has been widely investigated in cereals, but fewer studies have been conducted in root and tuber crops such as potato (Solanum tuberosum L.). The objective of this study was to investigate the source-sink relationship in potato and the regulation of water and nitrogen on the source-sink relationship during the tuber bulking stage. A pot experiment using virus-free plantlets of the Atlantic potato cultivar was conducted, using three water levels (50%, 70% and 90% of field capacity) and three nitrogen levels (0, 0.2, 0.4 g N∙kg−1 soil). The results showed that, under all water and nitrogen levels, plant source capacity were small at the end of the experiment, since photosynthetic activity in leaves were low and non-structural reserves in underground stems were completely remobilized. While at this time, there were very big differences in maximum and minimum tuber number and tuber weight, indicating that the sink tuber still had a large potential capacity to take in assimilates. These results suggest that the source-supplied assimilates were not sufficient enough to meet the demands of sink growth. Thus, we concluded that, unlike cereals, potato yield is more likely to be source-limited than sink-limited during the tuber bulking stage. Water and nitrogen are two key factors in potato production management. Our results showed that water level, nitrogen level and the interaction between water and nitrogen influence potato yield mainly through affecting source capacity via the net photosynthetic rate, total leaf area and leaf life span. Well-watered, sufficient nitrogen and well-watered combined with sufficient nitrogen increased yield mainly by enhancing the source capacity. Therefore, this suggests that increasing source capacity is more crucial to improve potato yield.
Highlights
Expanding population and consumption growth will increase the global agricultural productivity need before 2050 [1, 2]
Yield forming in cereals depends on two major sources: one source is the current canopy photosynthesis, and the other is the non-structural reserves stored in the canopy either pre- or post-anthesis [48,49,50,51,52]
Under normal growth conditions for tuber bulking, net photosynthetic rate, total leaf area, leaf life span, tuber number per plant and average tuber weight were all the doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0146877.g007
Summary
Expanding population and consumption growth will increase the global agricultural productivity need before 2050 [1, 2]. This increase should be achieved without additional farming land and inputs [3]. The organ or site in crop plants that synthesizes assimilates is called a source, such as the mature leaf. Crop yield, represented by the harvested organs, is influenced by the production of assimilates by the source and the extent to which they can accumulate in the sink [6]. Determining whether the source or sink limits yield is critical for increasing crop yield potential
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