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Responses of dioecious plants to climate change: A review on the potential mechanisms.

CHEN Xiao-mei1**, WEI Hui2, LIN Mei-zhen1   

  1. (1School of Geographical Sciences, Guangzhou University, Guangzhou 510006, China; 2South China Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510650, China)
  • Online:2014-11-10 Published:2014-11-10

Abstract:

Dioecious plants represent an important part of the terrestrial plants and play a relevant role in regulating the ecosystem structure and function. The female and male plants differ significantly from each other in their morphological and physiological characteristics, as well as in their resource allocation strategies. However, their sex-specific responses to climate changes and the potential mechanisms are still less studied up to date. In this paper, we reviewed the sex-specific responses of dioecious plants to climate changes, including global warming, precipitation change, and elevated atmospheric CO2 concentration. Based on literature analysis, we also discussed the mechanisms of such sexspecific responses of dioecious plants to climate changes. Finally, the potentially important study fields for dioecious plants in the context of global climate changes were presented. The review is expected to make a scientific contribution to understanding the stability of structure and function of ecosystems, especially for those ecosystems dominated by dioecious plants, under global change.
 

Key words: iron deficiency, tomato seedlings, suboptimal temperature, NO3- stress