INVESTIGADORES
SANTA MARIA Guillermo Esteban
artículos
Título:
Molecular Approaches to improve salt resistance in crops: facts and perspectives
Autor/es:
GUILLERMO E. SANTA-MARÍA
Revista:
Journal of Crop Improvement
Editorial:
Haworth Press
Referencias:
Año: 2003 vol. 7 p. 68 - 98
ISSN:
1542-7528
Resumen:
El Journal of Crop Improvement se llamó previamente Journal of Crop Production, bajo cuyo nombre se publicó este artículo (ver al respecto la publication history en https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=wcim20). ABSTRACTBecause of the expansion of agriculture into marginal environments, enhancement of crop resistance to soil salinity is becoming a frequent objective for breeders. The tools offered by molecular biology to transfer a single or a few genes provide a major hope to reduce the negative impact of broad gene transfer that takes place in wide-cross hybridizations. Due to the presence of osmotic and toxic components in the growth response of plants to salt stress, any attempt to improve plant performance in saline environments should ensure the maintenance of an adequate flux of water into plant tissues, and also avoid the build up of ions into the cell compartments where they can exert toxic effects. Besides, reduction of injury effects due to salinity on plant tissues is a highly desirable objective. Transgenic plants overexpressing ion transporters able to exclude Na+ into vacuoles, the enzymes required for the biosynthesis of several osmocompatible, organic solutes, or the enzymes participating in detoxification pathways, have been obtained. Some of these transgenic plants display an enhanced growth relative to their wild type parents in saline environments, although the way in which this resistance is achieved remains essentially unknown. A fourth and promising way to engineer salt resistance in plants is the attempt to manipulate gene regulatory pathways. The extent to which these experiences, mainly with model plants, could be extrapolated to crop plants growing in the field is discussed. It is proposed that a combination of different molecular approaches could be helpful to achieve enhanced salt resistance in crop plants.