2024 Awards in the Journal of Plant Research

Abstract

w information to describe the new species has received high praise.In Noda et al. (2023), the distinctive salt tolerance mechanisms of Vigna riukiuensis are reported. Vigna riukiuensis accumulates a high amount of sodium in the leaves, whereas the close relative Vigna nakashimae suppresses sodium allocation to the leaves as was shown previously using radio-Na imaging. The authors assumed that V. riukiuensis would have developed vacuoles for sodium sequestration, but there were no differences in size among salt-tolerant and salt-sensitive accessions. The authors observed high starch level in the chloroplasts of V. riukiuensis. Forced degradation of leaf starch by shading treatment resulted in no radio-Na ( 22 Na) accumulation in the leaves. SEM-EDX showed that Na is located in leaf sections and Na was detected in chloroplasts of V. riukiuensis, especially around the starch granules but not in the middle of those. These results represent the second evidence of a Na-trapping system by starch granules, following similar observation in common reed that accumulates starch granule at the shoot base. It is suggested to apply this system for developing salt-tolerant crops. The paper is remarkable not only with respect to its interesting results but also due to its slightly un-conventional structure. The logic of the experiments and the experiments themselves are very well explained and the results are illustrated in a very convincing way. It would be great to see more publications from this group to better understand this phenomenon of salt tolerance.