Embracing 3D Complexity in Leaf Carbon-Water Exchange

J Mason Earles; Thomas N Buckley; Craig R Brodersen; Florian A Busch; F Javier Cano; Brendan Choat; John R Evans; Graham D Farquhar; Richard Harwood; Minh Huynh; Grace P John; Megan L Miller; Fulton E Rockwell; Lawren Sack; Christine Scoffoni; Paul C Struik; Alex Wu; Xinyou Yin; Margaret M Barbour

doi:10.1016/j.tplants.2018.09.005

Embracing 3D Complexity in Leaf Carbon-Water Exchange

Trends Plant Sci. 2019 Jan;24(1):15-24. doi: 10.1016/j.tplants.2018.09.005. Epub 2018 Oct 9.

Authors

J Mason Earles¹, Thomas N Buckley², Craig R Brodersen³, Florian A Busch⁴, F Javier Cano⁵, Brendan Choat⁵, John R Evans⁴, Graham D Farquhar⁴, Richard Harwood⁶, Minh Huynh⁶, Grace P John⁷, Megan L Miller⁸, Fulton E Rockwell⁹, Lawren Sack⁷, Christine Scoffoni¹⁰, Paul C Struik¹¹, Alex Wu¹², Xinyou Yin¹¹, Margaret M Barbour¹³

Affiliations

¹ School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06511, USA; Equal contribution.
² Department of Plant Sciences, University of California Davis, CA 95916, USA; Equal contribution.
³ School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06511, USA.
⁴ Research School of Biology, Australian National University, Action, ACT 0200, Australia.
⁵ Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment, Western Sydney University, Richmond, NSW 2753, Australia.
⁶ University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia.
⁷ Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.
⁸ College of Natural Resources, University of Idaho, Moscow, ID 83844, USA.
⁹ Department of Organism and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.
¹⁰ Department of Biological Sciences, California State University Los Angeles, CA 90032, USA.
¹¹ Department of Plant Sciences, Wageningen University, Centre for Crop Systems Analysis, 6700 AK Wageningen, The Netherlands.
¹² Centre for Plant Science, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD 4072, Australia.
¹³ University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia; www.sydney.edu.au/science/people/margaret.barbour. Electronic address: margaret.barbour@sydney.edu.au.

PMID: 30309727
DOI: 10.1016/j.tplants.2018.09.005

Abstract

Leaves are a nexus for the exchange of water, carbon, and energy between terrestrial plants and the atmosphere. Research in recent decades has highlighted the critical importance of the underlying biophysical and anatomical determinants of CO₂ and H₂O transport, but a quantitative understanding of how detailed 3D leaf anatomy mediates within-leaf transport has been hindered by the lack of a consensus framework for analyzing or simulating transport and its spatial and temporal dynamics realistically, and by the difficulty of measuring within-leaf transport at the appropriate scales. We discuss how recent technological advancements now make a spatially explicit 3D leaf analysis possible, through new imaging and modeling tools that will allow us to address long-standing questions related to plant carbon-water exchange.

Keywords: 3D; leaf anatomy; leaf hydraulic conductance; mesophyll conductance; photosynthesis.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Review

MeSH terms

Biological Transport
Carbon / metabolism*
Imaging, Three-Dimensional*
Plant Leaves / anatomy & histology
Plant Leaves / metabolism*
Plant Leaves / physiology
Plant Leaves / ultrastructure
Water / metabolism*

Substances

Water
Carbon