Physiological and phenotypic characterization of the climate-resilient oilseed crop Camelina sativa in response to waterlogging

• Camelina (Camelina sativa) is an ancient European oilseed crop, which reemerges as an alternative to rapeseed for bioenergy, food, and feed. Camelina is characterized as a low-input crop that can be grown on poor soils and marginal land, and it shows good inherent tolerances towards adverse environmental conditions such as heat and drought. Thus, camelina has a great potential as a climate-smart crop needed to cope with growing challenges in agriculture due to climate change. Field crops are increasingly challenged also by excess water due to extreme precipitation and poor soil drainage. It is well established that many plants are susceptible to waterlogging, including important crops such as rapeseed.
• To investigate the responses and tolerance to waterlogging of stress-resilient camelina, 8 lines (cultivars and landraces) of different geographical origins were subjected to waterlogging. In addition to morphological and agronomic traits, physiological parameters such as chlorophyll content index and total antioxidant capacity of the leaves were determined.
• Camelina was very sensitive to waterlogging at vegetative growth stages, with a relatively short treatment of 4 days proving lethal for the plants. Waterlogging of 2 days resulted in growth inhibition and lower yields and was used to study the waterlogging response at two different vegetative growth stages before bolting. Generally, younger plants (7–9 leaves) were more sensitive than older plants (15–16 leaves), and morphological and physiological parameters showed significant age-dependent and line-specific changes due to waterlogging.
• These results underpin that waterlogging during the vegetative phase is a serious threat to camelina, which needs to be addressed by identifying and establishing tolerance to excess water to harness camelina’s potential as a true climate-smart crop.

Keywords: Abiotic stress, Climate change, Oilseed crop, Stress physiology

Acknowledgements: This work was funded by the Austrian Science Fund project P29676 and the NÖ Forschungs- und Bildungsgesellschaft mbH (NFB) project SC17-014.