Premium
Transpiration increases under high‐temperature stress: Potential mechanisms, trade‐offs and prospects for crop resilience in a warming world
Author(s) -
Sadok Walid,
Lopez Jose R.,
Smith Kevin P.
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
plant, cell and environment
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.646
H-Index - 200
eISSN - 1365-3040
pISSN - 0140-7791
DOI - 10.1111/pce.13970
Subject(s) - transpiration , climate change , environmental science , psychological resilience , context (archaeology) , global warming , productivity , natural resource economics , ecology , biology , economics , photosynthesis , psychology , paleontology , botany , macroeconomics , psychotherapist
The frequency and intensity of high‐temperature stress events are expected to increase as climate change intensifies. Concomitantly, an increase in evaporative demand, driven in part by global warming, is also taking place worldwide. Despite this, studies examining high‐temperature stress impacts on plant productivity seldom consider this interaction to identify traits enhancing yield resilience towards climate change. Further, new evidence documents substantial increases in plant transpiration rate in response to high‐temperature stress even under arid environments, which raise a trade‐off between the need for latent cooling dictated by excessive temperatures and the need for water conservation dictated by increasing evaporative demand. However, the mechanisms behind those responses, and the potential to design the next generation of crops successfully navigating this trade‐off, remain poorly investigated. Here, we review potential mechanisms underlying reported increases in transpiration rate under high‐temperature stress, within the broader context of their impact on water conservation needed for crop drought tolerance. We outline three main contributors to this phenomenon, namely stomatal, cuticular and water viscosity‐based mechanisms, and we outline research directions aiming at designing new varieties optimized for specific temperature and evaporative demand regimes to enhance crop productivity under a warmer and dryer climate.