Differentiation in drought tolerance mirrors the geographic distributions of alpine plants on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and adjacent highlands.

ABSTRACT: Climatic tolerance, especially drought tolerance, is one of the major factors shaping the geographic distributions of plant species. Thus, the general decline in rainfall from the Himalaya-Hengduan Mountains (HHM) to the inner Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (QTP) might account for the significant differences in species distributions and richness between the two regions. To test this hypothesis, we conducted a water stress experiment using four Anisodus species (A. tanguticus, A. luridus, A. carniolicoides and A. acutangulus), which were treated with different levels of water stress in a glasshouse, and examined their differences in physiological responses. The results suggest that A. tanguticus, which inhabits the inner QTP, generally has higher fitness under severe water stress than the other spec

SUBMITTER: Meng LH 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5307960 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature