Spatial variation and mechanisms of leaf water content in grassland plants at the biome scale: evidence from three comparative transects

Abstract Leaf water content (LWC) has important physiological and ecological significance for plant growth. However, it is still unclear how LWC varies over large spatial scale and with plant adaptation strategies. Here, we measured the LWC of 1365 grassland plants, along three comparative precipita...

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Autores principales:	Ruomeng Wang, Nianpeng He, Shenggong Li, Li Xu, Mingxu Li
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	Nature Portfolio 2021
Materias:	Medicine R Science Q
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/ada1313ac50147e7aa31e124fd47fc4e
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spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:ada1313ac50147e7aa31e124fd47fc4e2021-12-02T16:56:09ZSpatial variation and mechanisms of leaf water content in grassland plants at the biome scale: evidence from three comparative transects10.1038/s41598-021-88678-72045-2322https://doaj.org/article/ada1313ac50147e7aa31e124fd47fc4e2021-04-01T00:00:00Zhttps://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-88678-7https://doaj.org/toc/2045-2322Abstract Leaf water content (LWC) has important physiological and ecological significance for plant growth. However, it is still unclear how LWC varies over large spatial scale and with plant adaptation strategies. Here, we measured the LWC of 1365 grassland plants, along three comparative precipitation transects from meadow to desert on the Mongolia Plateau (MP), Loess Plateau, and Tibetan Plateau, respectively, to explore its spatial variation and the underlying mechanisms that determine this variation. The LWC data were normally distributed with an average value of 0.66 g g−1. LWC was not significantly different among the three plateaus, but it differed significantly among different plant life forms. Spatially, LWC in the three plateaus all decreased and then increased from meadow to desert grassland along a precipitation gradient. Unexpectedly, climate and genetic evolution only explained a small proportion of the spatial variation of LWC in all plateaus, and LWC was only weakly correlated with precipitation in the water-limited MP. Overall, the lasso variation in LWC with precipitation in all plateaus represented an underlying trade-off between structural investment and water income in plants, for better survival in various environments. In brief, plants should invest less to thrive in a humid environment (meadow), increase more investment to keep a relatively stable LWC in a drying environment, and have high investment to hold higher LWC in a dry environment (desert). Combined, these results indicate that LWC should be an important variable in future studies of large-scale trait variations.Ruomeng WangNianpeng HeShenggong LiLi XuMingxu LiNature PortfolioarticleMedicineRScienceQENScientific Reports, Vol 11, Iss 1, Pp 1-12 (2021)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	Medicine R Science Q
spellingShingle	Medicine R Science Q Ruomeng Wang Nianpeng He Shenggong Li Li Xu Mingxu Li Spatial variation and mechanisms of leaf water content in grassland plants at the biome scale: evidence from three comparative transects
description	Abstract Leaf water content (LWC) has important physiological and ecological significance for plant growth. However, it is still unclear how LWC varies over large spatial scale and with plant adaptation strategies. Here, we measured the LWC of 1365 grassland plants, along three comparative precipitation transects from meadow to desert on the Mongolia Plateau (MP), Loess Plateau, and Tibetan Plateau, respectively, to explore its spatial variation and the underlying mechanisms that determine this variation. The LWC data were normally distributed with an average value of 0.66 g g−1. LWC was not significantly different among the three plateaus, but it differed significantly among different plant life forms. Spatially, LWC in the three plateaus all decreased and then increased from meadow to desert grassland along a precipitation gradient. Unexpectedly, climate and genetic evolution only explained a small proportion of the spatial variation of LWC in all plateaus, and LWC was only weakly correlated with precipitation in the water-limited MP. Overall, the lasso variation in LWC with precipitation in all plateaus represented an underlying trade-off between structural investment and water income in plants, for better survival in various environments. In brief, plants should invest less to thrive in a humid environment (meadow), increase more investment to keep a relatively stable LWC in a drying environment, and have high investment to hold higher LWC in a dry environment (desert). Combined, these results indicate that LWC should be an important variable in future studies of large-scale trait variations.
format	article
author	Ruomeng Wang Nianpeng He Shenggong Li Li Xu Mingxu Li
author_facet	Ruomeng Wang Nianpeng He Shenggong Li Li Xu Mingxu Li
author_sort	Ruomeng Wang
title	Spatial variation and mechanisms of leaf water content in grassland plants at the biome scale: evidence from three comparative transects
title_short	Spatial variation and mechanisms of leaf water content in grassland plants at the biome scale: evidence from three comparative transects
title_full	Spatial variation and mechanisms of leaf water content in grassland plants at the biome scale: evidence from three comparative transects
title_fullStr	Spatial variation and mechanisms of leaf water content in grassland plants at the biome scale: evidence from three comparative transects
title_full_unstemmed	Spatial variation and mechanisms of leaf water content in grassland plants at the biome scale: evidence from three comparative transects
title_sort	spatial variation and mechanisms of leaf water content in grassland plants at the biome scale: evidence from three comparative transects
publisher	Nature Portfolio
publishDate	2021
url	https://doaj.org/article/ada1313ac50147e7aa31e124fd47fc4e
work_keys_str_mv	AT ruomengwang spatialvariationandmechanismsofleafwatercontentingrasslandplantsatthebiomescaleevidencefromthreecomparativetransects AT nianpenghe spatialvariationandmechanismsofleafwatercontentingrasslandplantsatthebiomescaleevidencefromthreecomparativetransects AT shenggongli spatialvariationandmechanismsofleafwatercontentingrasslandplantsatthebiomescaleevidencefromthreecomparativetransects AT lixu spatialvariationandmechanismsofleafwatercontentingrasslandplantsatthebiomescaleevidencefromthreecomparativetransects AT mingxuli spatialvariationandmechanismsofleafwatercontentingrasslandplantsatthebiomescaleevidencefromthreecomparativetransects
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Spatial variation and mechanisms of leaf water content in grassland plants at the biome scale: evidence from three comparative transects

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