Plant Salt Tolerance Methods and Protocols

Soil salinity is destroying several hectares of arable land every minute. Because remedial land management cannot completely solve the problem, salt tolerant crops or plant species able to remove excessive salt from the soil could contribute significantly to managing the salinity problem. The key to engineering crops for salt tolerance lies in a thorough understanding of the physiological mechanisms underlying the adaptive responses of plants to salinity. Plant Salt Tolerance: Methods and Protocols describes recent advances and techniques employed by researchers to understand the molecular and ionic basis of salinity tolerance and to investigate the mechanisms of salt stress perception and signalling in plants. With chapters written by leading international scientists, this book covers nearly 30 different methods, such as microelectrode and molecular methods, imaging techniques, as well as various biochemical assays. Written in the highly successful Methods in Molecular Biology™ series format, chapters contain introductions to their respective topics, lists of the necessary materials and reagents, step-by-step, readily reproducible laboratory protocols, and notes on troubleshooting and avoiding known pitfalls.

Authoritative and easily accessible, Plant Salt Tolerance: Methods and Protocols serves as an essential read for every student or researcher tackling various aspects of the salinity problem.

Part I. Microelectrode Techniques

1. Patch-Clamp Protocols to Study Cell Ionic Homeostasis under Saline Conditions

Ana María Velarde-Buendía, René Alberto Enríquez-Figueroa, and Igor Pottosin

2. Studying Plant Salt Tolerance with the Voltage Clamp Technique

Zhong-Hua Chen, Dezhi Wu, Cornelia Eisenach, Adrian Hills, Guoping Zhang, and Michael R. Blatt

3. Using the Multifunctional Xylem Pprobe for In situ Studies of Plant Water and Ion Relations under Saline Conditions

Lars H. Wegner

4. Measuring Intracellular Ion Concentrations with Multi-Barrelled Microelectrodes

Tony Miller and Susan Smith

5. Single-Cell Sampling and Analysis (SiCSA)

Wieland Fricke

6. Non-Invasive Flux Measurements Using Microsensors: Theory, Limitations and Systems

Ian Newman, Shao-Liang Chen, D. Marshall Porterfield, and Jian Sun

7. Quantifying Kinetics of Net Ion Fluxes from Plant Tissues by Non-Invasive Microelectrode Measuring MIFE Technique

Sergey Shabala, Tracey Cuin, Lana Shabala and Ian Newman

Part II. Imaging Techniques

8. Quantitative Cryo-Analytical Scanning Electron Microscopy (CEDX): An Important Technique Useful for Cell-Specific Localization of Salt

Margaret McCully and Martin Canny

9. Fluorescence Lifetime Imaging (FLIM) Measurements in Salinity Research

Olga Babourina and Zed Rengel

10. Cytosolic Ca2+ Determinations in Studying Plant Responses to Salinity and Oxidative Stress

Anuphon Laohavisit, Renato Colaço, and Julia Davies

11. Infrared Thermography in Plant Phenotyping for Salinity Tolerance

Richard A. James and Xavier R.R. Sirault

12. In vivo Imaging of Nitric Oxide and Reactive Oxygen Species Using Laser Scanning Confocal Microscopy

Yan-Jie Xie and Wen-Biao Shen

Part III. Biochemical Assays

13. Metabolomics for Salinity Research

Ute Roessner and Diane M. Beckles

14. Purification of Plant Plasma Membranes by Two-Phase Partitioning and Measurement of H+ Pumping

Anette Lund and Anja Thoe Fuglsang

15. Determination of Reactive Oxygen Species in Salt-Stressed Plant Tissues

Andrés Alberto Rodríguez and Edith L. Taleisnik

16. Quantification of the Antioxidant Activity in Salt-Stressed Tissues

Jelena J. Dragišic Maksimovic and Branka D. Živanovic

17. Quantification of Abscisic Acid, Cytokinin and Auxin Content in Salt-Stressed Plant Tissues

Petre I. Dobrev and Radomira Vankova

Part IV. Molecular Techniques

18. Fluorescence-Activated Cell Sorting for Analysis of Cell Type-Sspecific Responses to Salinity Stress in Arabidopsis and Rice

Aurelie Evrard, Bastiaan O. R. Bargmann, Kenneth D. Birnbaum, Mark Tester, Ute Baumann, and Alexander A. T. Johnson

19. Transformation Using Controlled cDNA Overexpression System

Gábor Rigó, Csaba Papdi, and László Szabados

20. Transcriptome Analysis of Membrane Transporters in Response to Salinity Stress

Prasad Senadheera1 and Frans J.M. Maathuis

21. Marker-Assisted Selection in Plant Breeding for Salinity Tolerance

M. Ashraf, N. A. Akram, Mehboob-ur-Rahman, and M. R. Foolad

22. Transcriptomics on Small Samples

Stuart J. Roy, Simon J. Conn, Gwenda M. Mayo, Asmini Athman, and Matthew Gilliham

23. Plastid Transformation for Abiotic Stress Tolerance in Plants

K.C. Bansal, A. K. Singh, and S. H. Wani

24. Manipulating Expression of Tonoplast Transporters

Zhigang Li, Man Zhou, Qian Hu, Shane Reighard, Shuangrong Yuan, Ning Yuan, Bekir San, Dayong Li, Haiyan Jia, and Hong Luo

25. Using Heterologous Expression Systems to Characterize Potassium and Sodium Transport Activities

Alonso Rodríguez-Navarro1, Begoña Benito, and Olivier Cagnac

Part V. Other Methods

26. Isotope Techniques to Study Kinetics of Na+ and K+ Transport Under Salinity Conditions

D.T. Britto and H.J. Kronzucker

27. Trait Dissection of Salinity Tolerance with Plant Phenomics

Bettina Berger, Bas de Regt, and Mark Tester

28. Measuring Soil Salinity

Marcus Hardie and Richard Doyle