Project name: From root to leaf, a study of the effect of a precision engineered protein hydrolysate and Ascophyllum nodosum-derived biostimulant in enhancing salinity stress tolerance in tomato

Description: Salinity stress is a major problem affecting plant growth and crop productivity. Whilst plant biostimulants have proven to be an effective solution to tackle salinity stress in different crops, the key genes and metabolic pathways involved in these tolerance processes remain unclear. This study focused on integrating phenotypic, physiological, biochemical and transcriptome data obtained from different tissues of tomato plants (cv. Micro-Tom) subjected to a saline irrigation water program for 61 days (EC: 5.8 dS/m) and treated with a protein hydrolysate and Ascophyllum nodosum-derived biostimulant (PSI-475). Overall, it can be concluded that PSI-475 treatment can provide long-term protective effects on salinity stressed tomato plants through well-defined osmotic adjustment (significant increase in relative water content (RWC) associated with proline and soluble sugars accumulation and upregulation of genes related to aquaporins (e.g. PIP2.1, TIP2.1)), ion detoxification (lower Na+ content and improved K+/Na+ ratio in young leaf tissue associated to enhanced gene expression of transporters related to ion homeostasis (e.g. NHX4)), photosynthetic (higher content of photosynthetic pigments (+19.8% to +27.5%) and increased expression of genes involved in photosynthetic efficiency and chlorophyll biosynthesis (e.g. LHC, RuBisCo, PORC)), and primary C and N metabolic mechanisms, thus leading to higher crop yield (fruit yield and fruit number by 47.5% and 32.5%, respectively).Overall design: The main goal of the experiment is to compare the transcriptomes between treated (PSI-475) and control (Untreated) groups of two different tomato plant tissues (Leaf and Root)

Data type: Transcriptome or Gene expression

Sample scope: Multiisolate

Relevance: Agricultural

Last updated: 2022-11-09