ArticleAnnals of botany2025
Mucilage facilitates root water uptake under edaphic stress: first evidence at the plant scale.
Article in Annals of botany, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.
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Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed.
- Root mucilage enhances plant water use under combined soil and atmospheric drought.Annals of botany · 2025Article
- On the importance of rhizosphere conductance and soil-root contact in drying soils.Annals of botany · 2025Article
- Maize root mucilage alters stomatal responses to soil and atmospheric drought: Implications for plant water use.Plant physiology · 2025Article
- Reverse microdialysis of sucrose stimulates soil fungal and bacterial growth at the microscale.BMC microbiology · 2025Article
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4 authors.
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Abstract
BACKGROUND AND
aimsMucilage has been hypothesized to soften the gradients in matric potential at the root-soil interface, thereby facilitating root water uptake in dry soils and maintaining transpiration with a moderate decline in leaf water potential. So far, this hypothesis has been tested only through simplified experiments and numerical simulations. However, the impact of mucilage on the relationship between transpiration rate (E) and leaf water potential (ψleaf) at the plant scale remains speculative.
methodsWe utilized an automated root pressure chamber to measure the E(ψleaf) relationship in two cowpea genotypes with contrasting mucilage production. We then utilized a soil-plant hydraulic model to reproduce the experimental observations and inferred the matric potential at the root-soil interface for both genotypes. KEY
resultsIn wet soil, the relationship between leaf water potential and transpiration rate (E) was linear for both genotypes. However, as the soil progressively dried, the E(ψleaf) relationship exhibited non-linearity. The genotype with low mucilage production exhibited non-linearity earlier during soil drying, i.e. in wetter soil conditions (soil water content <0.36 cm3 cm-3) compared to the genotype with high mucilage production (soil water content <0.30 cm3 cm-3). The incidence of non-linearity was concomitant with the decline in matric potential across the rhizosphere. High mucilage production attenuated water potential diminution at the root-soil interface with increased E. This shows, for the first time at the plant scale, that root mucilage softened the gradients in matric potential and maintained transpiration in drying soils. The model simulations indicate that a plausible explanation for this effect is an enhanced hydraulic conductivity of the rhizosphere in genotypes with higher mucilage production.
conclusionsMucilage exudation maintains the hydraulic continuity between soil and roots and decelerates the drop in matric potential near the root surface, thereby postponing the hydraulic limitations to transpiration during soil drying.
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