Arbuscular Mycorrhizal (AM) symbiosis is integral to sustainable agriculture and enhances plant resilience to abiotic and biotic stressors. Through their symbiotic association with plant roots, AM improves nutrient and water uptake, activates antioxidant defenses, and facilitates hormonal regulation, contributing to improved plant health and productivity. Plants release strigolactones, which trigger AM spore germination and hyphal branching, a process regulated by genes, such as D27, CCD7, CCD8, and MAX1. AM recognition by plants is mediated by receptor-like kinases (RLKs) and LysM domains, leading to the formation of arbuscules that optimize nutrient exchange. Hormonal regulation plays a pivotal role in this symbiosis; cytokinins enhance AM colonization, auxins support arbuscule formation, and brassinosteroids regulate root growth. Other hormones, such as salicylic acid, gibberellins, ethylene, jasmonic acid, and abscisic acid, also influence AM colonization and stress responses, further bolstering plant resilience. In addition to plant health, AM enhances soil health by improving microbial diversity, soil structure, nutrient cycling, and carbon sequestration. This symbiosis supports soil pH regulation and pathogen suppression, offering a sustainable alternative to chemical fertilizers and improving soil fertility. To maximize AM ’s potential of AM in agriculture, future research should focus on refining inoculation strategies, enhancing compatibility with different crops, and assessing the long-term ecological and economic benefits. Optimizing AM applications is critical for improving agricultural resilience, food security, and sustainable farming practices.

The pathways of water across root tissues and their relative contribution to plant water uptake remain debated. This is mainly due to technical challenges in measuring water flux non-invasively at the cellular scale under realistic conditions. We developed a new method to quantify water fluxes inside roots growing in soils. The method combines spatiotemporal quantification of deuterated water distribution imaged by rapid neutron tomography with an inverse simulation of water transport across root tissues. Using this non-invasive technique, we estimated for the first time the in-situ radial water fluxes [m s⁻¹] in apoplastic and cell-to-cell pathways. The water flux in the apoplast of twelve days-old lupins (Lupinus albus L. cv. Feodora) was seventeen times faster than in the cell-to-cell pathway. Hence, the overall contribution of the apoplast in water flow [m³ s⁻¹] across the cortex is, despite its small volume of 5%, as large as 57 ± 8% (Mean ± SD for n = 3) of the total water flow. This method is suitable to non-invasively measure the response of cellular scale root hydraulics and water fluxes to varying soil and climate conditions.

The relationship between leaf water potential, soil water potential, and transpiration depends on soil and plant hydraulics and stomata regulation. Recent concepts of stomatal response to soil drying relate stomatal regulation to plant hydraulics, neglecting the loss of soil hydraulic conductance around the roots. Our objective was to measure the effect of soil drying on the soil-plant hydraulic conductance of maize and to test whether stomatal regulation avoids a loss of soil-plant hydraulic conductance in drying soils. We combined a root pressure chamber, in which the soil-root system is pressurized to maintain the leaf xylem at atmospheric pressure, with sap flow sensors to measure transpiration rate. The method provides accurate and high temporal resolution measurements of the relationship between transpiration rate and xylem leaf water potential. A simple soil-plant hydraulic model describing the flow of water across the soil, root, and xylem was used to simulate the relationship between leaf water potential and transpiration rate. The experiments were carried out with 5-week-old maize grown in cylinders of 9 cm diameter and 30 cm height filled with silty soil. The measurements were performed at four different soil water contents (WC). The results showed that the relationship between transpiration and leaf water potential was linear in wet soils, but as the soil dried, the xylem tension increased, and nonlinearities were observed at high transpiration rates. Nonlinearity in the relationship between transpiration and leaf water potential indicated a decrease in the soil-plant hydraulic conductance, which was explained by the loss of hydraulic conductivity around the roots. The hydraulic model well reproduced the observed leaf water potential. Parallel experiments performed with plants not being pressurized showed that plants closed stomata when the soil-plant hydraulic conductance decreased, maintaining the linearity between leaf water potential and transpiration rate. We conclude that stomata closure during soil drying is caused by the loss of soil hydraulic conductivity in a predictable way.

The present study aimed to assess the relationship of soil properties in salt-affected soils. The soil samples were collected from 14 districts of Pakistan. Soil salinity and sodicity are the common features of the arid and semiarid regions. The effects of the salt’s interactions with soil micronutrients have not been well studied. Therefore, saline and non-saline soil samples were collected from different locations. The microelements (Fe, Cu, Mn, and Zn) were fractionated into water-soluble, exchangeable, carbonate, Fe + Mn oxide, organic, and residual fractions. Univariate and multivariate analysis (PCA) was carried out to determine the linear relationship between soil properties and micronutrients fractions. Results showed that the magnitude of micronutrients appeared to be affected by the salinity in soils. In saline soil, the Fe fractions differed in the order of residual > organic bound > Fe + Mn bound > carbonate bound > exchangeable > water soluble. Iron fractions varied in the non-saline soils as residual > Fe + Mn bound > organic bound > exchangeable > carbonate bound > water soluble. Copper concentration was higher in the residual and carbonate forms, and the amount was lower in the exchangeable and water-soluble forms under both saline and non-saline conditions. The water-soluble Mn fraction was lower, and the residual Mn fraction was proportionately higher than other forms of Mn in soils. Zinc was found mostly in the residual fraction in both saline and non-saline soils. The mobility factor of micronutrients in non-saline soil was greater than in saline soil. PCA revealed that organic matter (OM) and pH directly affected the fractionation of Cu, Mn, Zn, and Fe in soil. Thus, it could be inferred that salts can bring changes to the composition of micronutrients depending on the nature of the soil and the magnitude of salts.

Plants redistribute water from wet to dry soil layers through their roots, in the process called hydraulic redistribution. Although the relevance and occurrence of this process are well accepted, resolving the spatial distribution of hydraulic redistribution remains challenging. Here, we show how to use neutron radiography to quantify the rate of water efflux from the roots to the soil. Maize ( Zea mays L.) plants were grown in a sandy substrate 40 cm deep. Deuterated water (D ₂ O) was injected in the bottom wet compartment, and its transport through the roots to the top dry soil was imaged using neutron radiography. A diffusion–convection model was used to simulate the transport of D ₂ O in soil and root and inversely estimate the convective fluxes. Overnight, D ₂ O appeared in nodal and lateral roots in the top compartment. By inverse modeling, we estimated an efflux from lateral roots into the dry soil equal to j _r = 2.35 × 10 ⁻⁷ cm ⁻¹ . A significant fraction of the redistributed water flew toward the tips of nodal roots (3.85 × 10 ⁻⁸ cm ³ s ⁻¹ per root) to sustain their growth. The efflux from nodal roots depended on the roots’ length and growth rate. In summary, neutron imaging was successfully used to quantify hydraulic redistribution. A numerical model was needed to differentiate the effects of diffusion and convection. The highly resolved images showed the spatial heterogeneity of hydraulic redistribution.