In Austria, Christmas trees such as Norway spruce are suffering greatly from the heat and drought that climate change is increasingly bringing with them. Plant geneticist Kelly Swarts, who conducts research in Vienna, wants to make them more suitable for climate change with the help of crossed-in genes from her Balkan relatives.
The spruces from the Balkans could better withstand high temperatures and a lack of water, the researcher says in an interview on the website of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (ÖWA). The trees grown in this way can provide water transport cells that are better adapted to drought stress.
“For the spruce, our latitudes represent almost the southern end of its range,” says Swarts, who conducts research at the Gregor Mendel Institute for Molecular Plant Biology (GMI) at the ÖAW in Vienna: “Climate change is making it hotter and drier, and the populations Here they are not adapted to these conditions.” Therefore, they grow more slowly, are more susceptible to bark beetles and other threats, and die more often.
Balkan spruces are better adapted to heat
Spruce trees also grow further south, for example on the Balkan Peninsula. Such specimens are used for heat and drought. “This advantage could be put to good use in our populations,” the scientist said.
Although spruce pollen is often transported hundreds of kilometers, the Balkan population is still too far away for its genetic material to naturally strengthen local spruce trees. “It would take generations and centuries for positive adaptations to reach us,” says Swarts: “That is much too slow to combat rapid climate change.”
Wants to cross relevant genes in trees
“What would really help is crossing in the genes that are relevant for the desired adjustments,” says the expert. She wants to map this out by using annual rings to investigate how well an individual dealt with drought and heat in a year and which gene variants it carries in its genome. Model calculations can also be used to predict, based on the genome, how individuals will cope with the climatic conditions expected in Austria in 2050.
Such genes, for example, influence the size of the cells involved in water transport in the tree, she explains: ‘We suspect that fewer and larger cells make the trees more sensitive to drought stress.’ Her team trained a system with artificial intelligence (AI): categorize cells in images to test this thesis. Twenty gene changes were discovered that influence the shape of such cell walls.
Source: Krone
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