Influence of cadmium on morphophysiological traits and accumulation of phenolic compounds in two genotypes of buckwheat sprouts

Abstract

The focus of the experiment described in this paper has been to study the influence of cadmium on the morphophysiological and biochemical characteristics of buckwheat sprouts of various ploidity and to investigate stress responses of plants at early, physiologically sensitive stages of development. It has been established that growth of the aboveground plant organs and the root system of diploid buckwheat was more inhibited by cadmium compared to tetraploid buckwheat sprouts. Cadmium uptake by the aboveground parts of plants was insignificant and was not influenced by the ploidity level, whereas the root systems of tetraploid plants demonstrated an increased ability to accumulate cadmium compared to the roots of diploid buckwheat. According to the results of biochemical research of the buckwheat sprouts' ability to accumulate phenolic compounds of different classes and to produce phenylalanine ammonia lyase (PAL), the basic plant enzyme that catalyses phenolic biosynthesis, the tetraploid buckwheat species demonstrated an increase in all tested characteristics unlike the diploid form which showed a drop in the polyphenols content when PAL activity went up. The obtained results are relevant for further studies of phenolic biosynthesis in plant species of various ploidity levels and identifying the role of the key enzyme involved in phenolic compound metabolism that activates the phenylpropanoid pathway and can, in the case of increased cadmium exposure, be involved in the synthesis of secondary metabolites that are different from phenolic compounds.

C1 [Kazantseva, Varvara; Goncharuk, Evgenia; Kartashov, Alexander; Zagoskina, Natalia] IPP RAS, KA Timiryazev Inst Plant Physiol RAS, 35 Bot Skaya St, Moscow 127276, Russia.

[Mammadov, Ramazan] Pamukkale Univ, Fac Sci & Art, Dept Biol, TR-20017 Denizli, Turkey.