ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Plant Sci.
Sec. Plant Abiotic Stress
High-concentration peat drives divergent transcriptomic responses to enhance saline-alkaline tolerance and phytoremediation in two Suaeda species
Provisionally accepted
- Taizhou University, Taizhou, China
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Soil salinization threatens global land use and food security, and halophytes combined with peat amendments are promising for saline-alkali soil remediation. Here, we integrated transcriptomic and physiological analyses to investigate the adaptive responses of Suaeda glauca and S. salsa grown in saline-alkaline soils amended with peat at 0, 6, or 18 g/kg. Our results showed that a high peat concentration (18 g/kg) significantly improved salt tolerance and biomass accumulation in both species through distinct species-specific strategies. S. glauca upregulated growth-related pathways (e.g., nitrogen metabolism, and tricarboxylic acid cycle) mediated by bHLH and bZIP transcription factors (TFs), whereas S. salsa activated stress-mitigating secondary metabolism (e.g., flavonoids, phenylpropanoids, anthocyanins) regulated by MYB and NAC TFs. A conserved response across both species was the downregulation of genes involved in amino acid degradation, which helps conserve nitrogen for osmoprotection. RT-qPCR analysis confirmed the reliability of the RNA-seq data. This study identified 18 g/kg as the optimal peat concentration, uncovers species-specific adaptive mechanisms in halophytes, and lays a foundation for the precisely selection of halophyte-peat combinations in saline-alkaline soil remediation.
Keywords: Halophytes, peat, Phytoremediation, Salt-responsivegenes, Suaeda glauca, Suaeda salsa
Received: 05 Dec 2025; Accepted: 12 Feb 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Zhou, Du, Lü, Wang, Cai and Li. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Junmin Li
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