Brassinosteroids alleviate high-temperature injury in Ficus concinna seedlings via maintaining higher antioxidant defence and glyoxalase systems.[Pubmed: 25609563]

Although brassinosteroids (BRs) play crucial roles in plant development and stress tolerance, the mechanisms by which they have these effects are poorly understood. Here, we investigated the possible mechanism of exogenously applied BRs on reactive oxygen species (ROS), antioxidant defence and methylglyoxal (MG) detoxification systems in Ficus concinna seedlings grown under high-temperature (HT) stress for 48 h. Our results showed that the activities of ascorbate peroxidase (APX), superoxide dismutase (SOD), glutathione S-transferase (GST), glutathione peroxidase (GPX) and glyoxalase II (Gly II) were increased under two levels of HT stress. Compared with control the activities of catalase (CAT) and dehydroascorbate reductase (DHAR) were not changed due to HT stress. The activities of glutathione reductase (GR), monodehydroascorbate reductase (MDHAR) and glyoxalase I (Gly I) were increased only at moderate HT stress. Despite these protective mechanisms, HT stress induced oxidative stress in F. concinna seedlings, as indicated by the increased levels of ROS, malondialdehyde (MDA) and MG, and the reductions in chlorophyll levels and relative water content. The contents of reduced glutathione (GSH) and ascorbate (AsA) were not changed under moderate HT stress. Spraying with 24-epibrassinolide (EBR) alone had little influence on the non-enzymatic antioxidants and the activities of antioxidant enzymes. However, EBR pretreatment under HT stress resulted in an increase in GSH and AsA content, maintenance of high redox state of GSH and AsA, and enhanced ROS and MG detoxification by further elevating the activities of SOD, GST, GPX, APX, MDHAR, GR, DHAR, Gly I and Gly II, as evident by lower level of ROS, MDA and MG. It may be concluded that EBR could alleviate the HT-induced oxidative stress by increasing the enzymatic and non-enzymatic antioxidant defence, and glyoxalase systems in F. concinna seedlings.

Cyclic electron flow around photosystem I is required for adaptation to high temperature in a subtropical forest tree, Ficus concinna.[Pubmed: 19817004]

Dissipation mechanisms of excess photon energy under high-temperature stress were studied in a subtropical forest tree seedling, Ficus concinna. Net CO(2) assimilation rate decreased to 16% of the control after 20 d high-temperature stress, and thus the absorption of photon energy exceeded the energy required for CO(2) assimilation. The efficiency of excitation energy capture by open photosystem II (PSII) reaction centres (F(v)'/F(m)') at moderate irradiance, photochemical quenching (q(P)), and the quantum yield of PSII electron transport (Phi(PSII)) were significantly lower after high-temperature stress. Nevertheless, non-photochemical quenching (q(NP)) and energy-dependent quenching (q(E)) were significantly higher under such conditions. The post-irradiation transient of chlorophyll (Chl) fluorescence significantly increased after the turnoff of the actinic light (AL), and this increase was considerably higher in the 39 degrees C-grown seedlings than in the 30 degrees C-grown ones. The increased post-irradiation fluorescence points to enhanced cyclic electron transport around PSI under high growth temperature conditions, thus helping to dissipate excess photon energy non-radiatively.