Springer Salt Stress in Plants: Signalling, Omics and Adaptations

Environmental conditions and changes, irrespective of source, cause a variety of stresses, one of the most prevalent of which is salt stress. Excess amount of salt in the soil adversely affects plant growth and development, and impairs production. Nearly 20% of the world’s cultivated area and nearly half of the world’s irrigated lands are affected by salinity. Processes such as seed germination, seedling growth and vigour, vegetative growth, flowering and fruit set are adversely affected by high salt concentration, ultimately causing diminished economic yield and also quality of produce. Most plants cannot tolerate salt-stress. High salt concentrations decrease the osmotic potential of soil solution, creating a water stress in plants and severe ion toxicity. The interactions of salts with mineral nutrition may result in nutrient imbalances and deficiencies. The consequence of all these can ultimately lead to plant death as a result of growth arrest and molecular damage. To achieve salt-tolerance, the foremost task is either to prevent or alleviate the damage, or to re-establish homeostatic conditions in the new stressful environment. Barring a few exceptions, the conventional breeding techniques have been unsuccessful in transferring the salt-tolerance trait to the target species. A host of genes encoding different structural and regulatory proteins have been used over the past 5–6 years for the development of a range of abiotic stress-tolerant plants. It has been shown that using regulatory genes is a more effective approach for developing stress-tolerant plants. Thus, understanding the molecular basis will be helpful in developing selection strategies for improving salinity tolerance. This book will shed light on the effect of salt stress on plants development, proteomics, genomics, genetic engineering, and plant adaptations, among other topics. The book will cover around 25 chapters with contributors from all over the world. From the Back Cover Among abiotic stresses, soil salinity and sodality are major problems limiting plant growth and productivity. These problems are of great concern for countries whose economies rely on agriculture. Currently more than 100 countries are adversely affected by salinity and sodality and in many of these regions salinization is caused due to irrigation. . The production of crop is low in saline soil due to salt toxicity which interferes with nutrient uptake. The responses to salt stress comprise of wide range of changes at the molecular, biochemical and physiological levels. Plants withstand these stresses by modulating certain biochemical pathways. Tolerance mechanism of plants towards salinity is still a debated question. Biotechnological approaches have improved a lot in understanding the mechanisms of salt tolerance in plants. Omic approach is one of the recent tools that help us in understanding the physiology and biochemistry of the cells under salinity stress. Signalling is also an important way to understand the salinity tolerance. This volume has been compiled with the help a galaxy of researchers all over the world encompassing plant biologists and soil scientists.   This book will be useful for those who are interested in stress biology of plants and would provide information about the role of omics and signalling in plants under salinity. About the Author Dr. Parvaiz Ahmad (Editor)   Dr. Parvaiz is Assistant professor in Botany at A.S. College, Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir, India. He has completed his post-graduation in Botany in 2000 from Jamia Hamdard New Delhi India. After his Ph.D from Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi, India in 2007 he joined International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology, New Delhi, India. His main research area is stress physiology and molecular biology. He has published more than 30 research papers in peer reviewed journals and 16 book chapters. He has also edited three volume