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Contrasting responses of crop legumes and cereals to nitrogen availability
Author(s) -
Adams Mark A.,
Buckley Thomas N.,
Salter William T.,
Buchmann Nina,
Blessing Carola H.,
Turnbull Tarryn L.
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
new phytologist
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.742
H-Index - 244
eISSN - 1469-8137
pISSN - 0028-646X
DOI - 10.1111/nph.14918
Subject(s) - agronomy , crop , biology , nitrogen , nitrogen fixation , agroforestry , chemistry , organic chemistry
Summary In nonagricultural systems, the relationship between intrinsic water‐use efficiency ( WUE i ) and leaf nitrogen (N area ) is known to be stronger for legumes than for nonlegumes. We tested whether these relationships are retained for major agricultural legumes and nonlegumes. We compared the response to N nutrition of WUE i (and its component parts, photosynthesis ( A sat ) and stomatal conductance ( g s )) for legumes Cicer arietinum , Glycine max , Lupinus alba and Vicia faba , nonlegume dicots Brassica napus and Helianthus annus , and nonlegume cereals Hordeum vulgare and Triticum aestivum . Surprisingly, and in contrast to studied cereals and nonlegume dicots, N area was positively related to photosynthesis in the legumes, explaining nearly half of the variance in A sat . WUE i was tightly coupled to N area for agricultural legumes and nonlegume dicots, but not for cereal crops. Our analysis suggests that breeding efforts to reduce g s in legumes could increase WUE i by 120–218% while maintaining A sat at nonlegume values. Physiologically informed breeding of legumes can enhance sustainable agriculture by reducing requirements for water and N.