Abstract
Water scarcity is the major limiting factor for oasis-desert agricultural production of cotton. It is necessary to improve cotton for drought tolerance and minimize drought-related crop losses, and the transgenic approach is efficient for cotton improvement. In order to evaluate the value of ScALDH21 transgenic cotton (G. hirsutum L.), it was tested in the main cotton region of south Xinjiang, in an environment of extreme drought around the desert. Transgenic cotton, overexpressing aldehyde dehydrogenase gene (ScALDH21) from the desiccation-tolerant moss Syntrichia caninervis in cotton variety Xin Nong Mian 1, was field-tested under six treatments based on three irrigation schedules and two irrigation levels (full (FI) and deficit (DI) irrigation) as follows: root zone model-simulated forecast irrigation (F) (FFI and FDI), soil moisture sensor-based irrigation (S) (SFI and SDI), and flood irrigation based on experience estimates (E) (EFI and EDI) to evaluate growth and yield performances. The results revealed that plant height and leaf area increased significantly in ScALDH21-transgenic cotton genotypes under all treatments. Physiological parameters such as chlorophyll content, net photosynthesis rate, and instantaneous water use efficiency were not significantly highly in transgenic lines compared to non-transgenic plants (NT). However, transgenic lines showed significantly improved yield and superior fiber quality than NT plants regardless of irrigation. The results demonstrate that ScALDH21-transgenic lines were excellent compared to NT plants under different water deficiency conditions. The study also provides guidelines for optimal irrigation protocol and minimum water requirements for the use of the ScALDH21-transgenic cotton lines in arid zones.
Highlights
The freshwater shortage is the most critical environmental factor that limits agricultural production and threatens food security and countries’ societal stability
We demonstrated that overexpression of aldehyde dehydrogenase gene (ScALDH21) from a desiccation-tolerant desert moss Syntrichia caninervis improved salt and drought stress in tobacco and cotton [15,16,17]
We found that the yield of the ScALDH21-transgenic lines outperformed compared to non-transgenic plants (NT) plants under all the irrigation protocols during three growing seasons
Summary
The freshwater shortage is the most critical environmental factor that limits agricultural production and threatens food security and countries’ societal stability. A number of genes that had high potential for enhancing drought tolerance were discovered and examined in transgenic plants, and some appeared to be promising for crop improvement [2,3,4,5,6]. Cotton overexpressing ScALDH21 lines exhibited improved physiological and morphological parameters, especially higher peroxidase (POD) and lower malondialdehyde (MDA), which are key indices in the reduction of reactive oxygen species and lipid peroxidation [16,18]. This result indicated that overexpression of ScALDH21 acts as a ROS scavenger. The output of experimental results could be useful for agriculture in arid land [19,20]
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