Opisthopappus taihangensis (Ling) Shih, as a relative of chrysanthemum, mainly survives on the cracks of steep slopes and cliffs. Due to the harsh environment in which O. taihangensis lives, it has evolved strong adaptive traits to drought stress. The root system first perceives soil water deficiency, triggering a multi-pronged response mechanism to maintain water potential; however, the drought tolerance mechanism of O. taihangensis roots remains unclear. Therefore, roots were selected as materials to explore the physiological and molecular responsive mechanisms. We found that the roots had a stronger water retention capacity than the leaves. This result was attributed to ABA accumulation, which promoted an increased accumulation of proline and trehalose to maintain cell osmotic pressure, activated SOD and POD to scavenge ROS to protect root cell membrane structure and induced suberin depositions to minimize water backflow to dry soil. Transcriptome sequencing analyses further confirmed that O. taihangensis strongly activated genes involved in the ABA signalling pathway, osmolyte metabolism, antioxidant enzyme activity and biosynthesis of suberin monomer. Overall, these results not only will provide new insights into the drought response mechanisms of O. taihangensis but also will be helpful for future drought breeding programmes of chrysanthemum.

Opisthopappus taihangensis (Ling) Shih, a wild relative germplasm of chrysanthemum, releases a completely different fragrance from chrysanthemum species. We aimed to identify the volatile compounds of the leaves of O. taihangensis and four other Chrysanthemum species using headspace solid-phase micro-extraction combined with gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (HS-SPME-GC/MS). In total, 70 compounds were detected, and terpenoids accounted for the largest percentage in these five species. Many specific compounds were only emitted from O. taihangensis and not from the other four species. In particular, 1,8-cineole could be responsible for the special leaf fragrance of O. taihangensis as it accounted for the largest proportion of the compounds in O. taihangensis but a small or no proportion at all in other species. The glandular trichomes (GTs) in the leaves are the main organs responsible for the emission of volatiles. To explore the relationship between the emissions and the density of the GTs on the leaf epidermis, the shape and density of the GTs were observed and calculated, respectively. The results showed that the trichomes have two shapes in these leaves: T-shaped non-glandular trichomes and capitate trichomes. Histochemical staining analyses indicated that terpenoids are mainly emitted from capitate glandular trichomes. Correlation analysis showed that the volatile amount of terpenoids is highly related to the density of capitate trichomes. In O. taihangensis, the terpenoids content and density of capitate trichomes are the highest. We identified the diversity of leaf volatiles from O. taihangensis and four other Chrysanthemum species and found a possible relationship between the content of volatile compounds and the density of capitate trichomes, which explained the cause of the fragrance of O. taihangensis leaves.