AUTHOR=Duarte Bernardo , Sleimi Noomene , Caçador Isabel TITLE=Biophysical and biochemical constraints imposed by salt stress: learning from halophytes JOURNAL=Frontiers in Plant Science VOLUME=Volume 5 - 2014 YEAR=2014 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/plant-science/articles/10.3389/fpls.2014.00746 DOI=10.3389/fpls.2014.00746 ISSN=1664-462X ABSTRACT=

Soil salinization is one of the most important factors impacting plant productivity. About 3.6 billion of the world’s 5.2 billion ha of agricultural dry land, have already suffered erosion, degradation, and salinization. Halophytes are typically considered as plants able to complete their life cycle in environments where the salt concentration is above 200 mM NaCl. Salinity adjustment is a complex phenomenon but essential mechanism to overcome salt stress, with both biophysical and biochemical implications. At this level, halophytes evolved in several directions, adopting different strategies. Otherwise, the lack of adaptation to a salt environment would negatively affect their electron transduction pathways and the entire energetic metabolism, the foundation of every plant photosynthesis and biomass production. The maintenance of ionic homeostasis is in the basis of all cellular counteractive measures, in particular in terms of redox potential and energy transduction. In the present work the biophysical mechanisms underlying energy capture and transduction in halophytes are discussed alongside with their relation with biochemical counteractive mechanisms, integrating data from photosynthetic light harvesting complexes, electron transport chains to the quinone pools, carbon fixation, and energy dissipation metabolism.