Chamber‐based system for measuring whole‐plant transpiration dynamics

Abstract

Accurate measurement of leaf transpiration (E) and related stomatal conductance (g s ) is fundamental to understanding plant energy dynamics and water relations at all scales, from pot to field (Pearcy et al., 2000). It is inextricably linked to photosynthesis as E and carbon assimilation share the same route in their way out of and into the leaf (Stanhill, 1986). It is a major component of the hydrological cycle and is a useful reflection of the adjustments of a plant to the surrounding environment. Available methods to measure E in herbaceous plants include: (1) porometers or infrared gas analyzers (IRGAs) that measure either at the single leaf or whole-plant level; (2) lysimeters that measure intact soil column weight loss (usually combining E and evaporation of individual plants or smaller communities) (Bello & Van Rensburg, 2017); (3) Eddy covariance; and (4) remote sensing methods encompassing landscape and regional scales with satellite image analysis (Talsma, 2018). However, measurements on individual leaves using hand-held IRGAs/porometers are unable to capture whole plant heterogeneity arising from differences in leaf age, leaf position, plant architecture, as well as temperature and boundary layer (Pearcy et al., 2000). Whole-plant chambers linked to an IRGA, on the other hand, are costly and replication is timeconsuming (Ryan et al., 2016). In both cases, it is difficult to relate cuvette to field conditions (Tardieu & Simonneau, 1998). Whereas

Plants perceive aerosols as an intensification of atmospheric dryness and react according to their isohydricity

“…For ambient aerosols, we compared plants grown in parallel ventilated greenhouses with and without aerosol exclusion by filtration. Water use efficiency (WUE) and the descriptive parameters of the Ball-Berry model (Ball et al, 1987) were obtained and compared with direct measurements of related parameters (Medlyn et al, 2017;Yi et al, 2019;Yuan et al, 2019;Pieters et al, 2022). Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images were obtained to evaluate leaf surface characteristics and stomatal structures.…”

A gravimetric method to monitor transpiration under water stress conditions in wheat

“…Due to the difficulty of maintaining soil water content in a field setting, experiments of this kind are most often conducted in a controlled environment using potted plants. Although there are multiple methodologies for measuring transpiration and soil water content in isolation, no approach combines the two as effectively as the gravimetric method (Liyanage et al., 2022; McCauley et al., 2021; Pieters et al., 2022). Gravimetric instruments, such as a weighing lysimeter, measure soil water content by mass.…”