Abstract
ABSTRACT Hydropotes are specialized epidermal structures involved in water and mineral flux into and out of the plant body. We analyzed hydropote morphology of four species of Nymphaeaceae: Nymphaea caerulea, Nymphaea lotus, Nymphaea rubra, and Victoria amazonica. Leaf samples were processed following conventional techniques for plant anatomy and for scanning and transmission electron microscopy. We observed hydropotes comprising an elongated apical sharp-pointed portion with a base composed of two to three short specialized cells. In a later developmental stage the apical sharp-pointed portion was detached and the mature hydropotes comprised an upper lens-shaped cell, a bowl-shaped cell and a large foot cell. Ultrastructural analysis revealed that the lens-shaped cell possesses labyrinthine projections in its outer periclinal wall and abundant plasmodesmata in its inner periclinal wall. Several mitochondria were present in the cytoplasm of both the lens-shaped and the bowl-shaped cells. The cytoplasm of the foot cell was reduced and possessed plastids with starch grains. The ultrastructure of the hydropotes is typical of cells involved in transporting substances and corroborates their role in the flux of substances into and out of the cell. These findings contribute to a better understanding of the functioning of hydropotes and shed light on this little-explored issue.
Highlights
Plants communicate with the environment through specialized epidermal structures, which are involved in the maintenance of their essential physiological and biochemical processes (Carpenter 2006) and in their establishment in the most diverse environments (Dickson 2000; Javelle et al 2011)
The young hydropotes were morphologically similar to non-glandular trichomes, being comprised of an elongated sharp-pointed apical portion with 1-4 cells and base composed of two short cells (Fig. 1C)
We did not disregard the sharp-pointed apical portion of young hydropotes and we proposed differential functions to hydropotes according to their distinct shape in different developmental stages
Summary
Plants communicate with the environment through specialized epidermal structures, which are involved in the maintenance of their essential physiological and biochemical processes (Carpenter 2006) and in their establishment in the most diverse environments (Dickson 2000; Javelle et al 2011). Hydropotes (water drinkers) are epidermal appendices specialized for life in an aquatic environment (Fahn 1979) They are present on the abaxial surface of floating leaves (Fahn 1979; Wilkinson 1979; Catian & Scremin-Dias 2013) and reproductive floating organs (Zini et al 2017; Coiro & Lumaga 2018) of some species of aquatic plants such as those belonging to Aponogetonaceae, Menyanthaceae, Potamogetonaceae, Nymphaeaceae, Alismataceae (Lavid et al 2001), and Cabombaceae (Borsch et al 2008). It has been shown that when exposed to cadmium, for example, hydropotes are able to trap cadmium-crystals through the activities of peroxidase
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