Temperature influences waterlogging stress-induced damage in Arabidopsis through the regulation of photosynthesis and hypoxia-related genes

Waterlogging hampers plants growth and development, and its detrimental effects are strongly influenced by environmental factors. One of these factors is an ambient temperature. In this work, we showed that damage caused by waterlogging stress to Arabidopsis thaliana was less severe at lower temperatures than that at higher temperatures. The leaf photochemistry characteristics (chlorophyll fluorescence Fv/Fm, YII, ETR, and qP characteristics), chlorophyll content, and leaf temperature were more stable, and plants accumulated less malondialdehyde during waterlogging stress at low temperature (16 °C) than at elevated temperature (22 °C and/or 28 °C). Transcripts of hypoxia-related genes (such as ADH1, SUS1, PDC1, RAP2.3 and HRE1/2) were less induced after waterlogging treatment under higher temperature compared to lower temperature at early time points (3 h or 6 h) while they showed a conversed trend at later time points. Thus, we conclude that temperature may affect Arabidopsis waterlogging tolerance through the regulation of expression of hypoxia marker genes, photosynthesis, leaf transpirational cooling, and MDA accumulation.