From soaking wet to bone-dry

Soils are known to undergo dramatic changes in water content with time, and conditions of either too much or too little water restult in severe abiotic stress to rice. The proposed project therefore aims at unravelling the responses of key root traits to sudden changes in soil water status. Allegedly, there is overlap in responses of root acclimations to these contrasting water conditions, e.g., formation of cortical aerenchyma and suberization of the root exodermis. The project seeks to unravel the environmental signals leading to these acclimations using rice as a model plant. These findings are expected to help breeding for climate-reslient rice varieties tolerating sudden changes in soil water content.