El cambio climático y la fragancia de las flores

La razón principal por la cual las flores producen aromas, es para atraer insectos polinizadores. Para ello, flores montan una mezcla de docenas y a veces cientos, de sustancias volátiles de varios grupos bioquímicos.

Los científicos ya han demostrado que el aumento de la temperatura asociado con el cambio climático global, tiene un efecto negativo sobre el crecimiento de las plantas.
Un estudiante de doctorado de la Universidad Hebrea de jerusalem, realizó una ampliación de esta investigación y demostró que el aumento de la temperatura ambiente también conduce a una disminución en la producción de aromas florales.

“Los aumentos de temperatura producidos por el cambio climático, están interfiriendo con la conexión planta-polinizador, una interacción facilitada principalmente por color floral y el olor”, según explica en su investigación Alon Can’ani, de la Facultad de Agricultura, Alimentos y Medio Ambiente de la UHJ.

En sus investigaciones descubrieron los mecanismos que permiten a las plantas regular su producción de olor. A partir de ello, se están diseñando estrategias para superar la disminución en la producción de sustancias beneficiosas volátiles, un proceso que requiere una inversión de enorme energía de las plantas.

Esta investigación le valió a Can’ani y su equipo el Smith Vision Prize, que se otorga anualmente a un estudiante de doctorado cuya investigación contribuye a alimentar al mundo, a través de una agricultura sostenible y cuya investigación muestra potencial de aplicabilidad en campos relevante para la agricultura, alimentación y medio ambiente.

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Award-Winning Research: As Temperatures Rise, Flowers Emit Less Scent
Smith Vision Prize Awarded for Research on Plants’ Scent Production in a Changing Global Climate

Jerusalem, June 6, 2016 – The diverse and delicious fragrances of flowers brighten our days and inspire poetry. The more practical reason that flowers produce scent is to attract pollinating insects to the flowers’ reproductive organs, thereby ensuring the continued existence of plant species. To do this, flowers assemble a mixture of dozens, and sometimes hundreds, of volatile substances from several biochemical groups.

Scientists have known for some time that increasing temperatures associated with global climate change have a negative effect on plant growth. Expanding on this research, a Hebrew University of Jerusalem PhD student has shown that increases in ambient temperature also lead to a decrease in the production of floral scents.

“Increases in temperature associated with the changing global climate are interfering with plant-pollinator mutualism, an interaction facilitated mainly by floral color and scent,” Alon Can’ani explained in his research.

At the Hebrew University’s Robert H. Smith Faculty of Agriculture, Food and Environment, Can’ani studies control mechanisms that allow plants to regulate their production of smell, is researching strategies to overcome the decrease in production of beneficial volatile substances, a process that requires a huge energy investment from plants.

During his work in the laboratory of Prof. Alexander Vainstein, in the Robert H. Smith Institute of Plant Sciences and Genetics in the Faculty of Agriculture, Can’ani discovered that Petunia plants grown at elevated temperature conditions are significantly defected in production and emission of scent compounds.

“In my study, I show that increasing ambient temperature leads to a decrease in phenylpropanoid-based floral scent production in two Petunia×hybrida varieties, P720 and Blue Spark, acclimated at 22/16 or 28/22 °C (day/night),” Can’ani said.

This was linked to arrested expression and activity of proteins that facilitate biosynthesis of the compounds.

Can’ani was awarded the Smith Vision Prize for his body of research, which included projects aimed at finding novel strategies that plants use in order to regulate, or fine-tune, the process of scent emission.

Can’ani also demonstrated an approach to bypass this adverse effect, by expressing the Arabidopsis thaliana PAP1 gene, which boosts the production of scent regardless of the ambient temperature. This research was published in Plant, Cell & Environment (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25402319).

Can’ani also characterized the first gene (called PH4) that functions as a direct regulator of scent emission. When he manipulated the expression of this gene to a halt, Petunia flowers ceased to emit scent, but continued to produce it. Interestingly, this gene apparently serves as a switch between two crucial floral traits – color and scent. This research was published in New Phytologist (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26111005).

Currently, Can’ani is investigating a process called glycosylation, in which flowers conjugate a sugar molecule onto the scent compounds, thus rendering the scent non-volatile.

The Smith Vision Prize in Agriculture was established by David Bruce Smith in memory of his father Robert H. Smith, benefactor, visionary, friend and namesake of the Faculty of Agriculture, Food and Environment. It is awarded annually to a PhD student whose research best reflects the vision of Smith in feeding the world through sustainable agriculture and whose research shows potential for applicability in fields relevant to agriculture, food and environment. It was awarded during the 79th international Meeting of the Hebrew University’s Board of Governors in Jerusalem