Research Information System
Journal of Forest and Environmental Science, vol.40, no.1, pp.43-52, 2024 (Peer-Reviewed Journal)
Cadmium (Cd) is non-essential heavy metal that negatively affects plant metabolism. Nitric oxide (NO) is an increasingly important molecule for plant metabolism that makes signaling. In this study, it was aimed to investigate the alleviating effect of sodium nitroprusside (SNP) application as NO donor in white poplar (Populus alba) under Cd stress conditions. SNP and without SNP treatments increased the Cd accumulation in root tissue. While photosynthetic pigments (Chl a, Chl b, Chl a+b, and carotenoid) content decreased by only Cd application, SNP+Cd application decreased the rate of photosynthetic pigments reduction. When the results of Cd and Cd+SNP applications were evaluated for mineral (Fe, Zn, Mn and Cu) uptake, it was found that the positive effect of SNP was heterogeneously affected. Depending on SNP application, it was found that malondialdehyde (MDA) amount decreased in leaf in 100 μM Cd applications while hydrogen peroxide (H2O 2) amount decreased in 100 and 500 μM Cd applications. When antioxidant enzyme activities were examined, it was found that catalase (CAT) and ascorbate peroxidase (APX) enzyme activities increased with 100 μM SNP applications under all Cd applications. As a result, it was found that SNP application under Cd stress generally supports physiological processes positively in white poplar, suggesting that NO molecule plays important alleviating roles in plant metabolism.