title: Methylglyoxal alleviates cadmium toxicity in wheat (Triticum aestivum L).
abstract: Methylglyoxal alleviates cadmium toxicity in wheat (Triticum aestivum L) by improving plant growth. For a long time, the reactive α, β-carbonyl ketoaldehyde methylglyoxal (CH3COCHO; MG) has been regarded as merely a toxic metabolite in plants, but, now, emerging as a signal molecule in plants. In this study, cadmium (Cd) stress decreased plant height, root length, fresh weight (FW), and dry weight (DW) in a concentration-dependent manner, indicating that Cd had toxic effects on the growth of wheat seedlings. The toxic effects of Cd were alleviated by exogenously applied MG in a dosage dependent fashion, and 700 mM MG reached significant differences, but this alleviating effect was eliminated by the treatment with N-acetyl-L-cysteine (NAC, MG scavenger), suggesting that MG could mitigate Cd toxicity in wheat. This study reported for the first time that MG could alleviate Cd toxicity in wheat, uncovering a new possible physiological function for MG, and opening a novel line of research in plant stress biology.
authors.affiliation: School of Life Sciences, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, 650092, People's Republic of China. zhongguang_li@163.com.|Engineering Research Center of Sustainable Development and Utilization of Biomass Energy, Ministry of Education, Kunming, 650092, People's Republic of China. zhongguang_li@163.com.|Key Laboratory of Biomass Energy and Environmental Biotechnology, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, 650092, Yunnan Province, People's Republic of China. zhongguang_li@163.com.
authors.forename: Zhong-Guang
authors.initials: ZG
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: School of Life Sciences, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, 650092, People's Republic of China.|Engineering Research Center of Sustainable Development and Utilization of Biomass Energy, Ministry of Education, Kunming, 650092, People's Republic of China.|Key Laboratory of Biomass Energy and Environmental Biotechnology, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, 650092, Yunnan Province, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Xiang-Qiu
authors.initials: XQ
authors.lastname: Duan
authors.affiliation: School of Life Sciences, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, 650092, People's Republic of China.|Engineering Research Center of Sustainable Development and Utilization of Biomass Energy, Ministry of Education, Kunming, 650092, People's Republic of China.|Key Laboratory of Biomass Energy and Environmental Biotechnology, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, 650092, Yunnan Province, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Yan-Mei
authors.initials: YM
authors.lastname: Xia
authors.affiliation: School of Life Sciences, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, 650092, People's Republic of China.|Engineering Research Center of Sustainable Development and Utilization of Biomass Energy, Ministry of Education, Kunming, 650092, People's Republic of China.|Key Laboratory of Biomass Energy and Environmental Biotechnology, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, 650092, Yunnan Province, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Yue
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: School of Life Sciences, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, 650092, People's Republic of China.|Engineering Research Center of Sustainable Development and Utilization of Biomass Energy, Ministry of Education, Kunming, 650092, People's Republic of China.|Key Laboratory of Biomass Energy and Environmental Biotechnology, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, 650092, Yunnan Province, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Zhi-Hao
authors.initials: ZH
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.affiliation: School of Life Sciences, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, 650092, People's Republic of China.|Engineering Research Center of Sustainable Development and Utilization of Biomass Energy, Ministry of Education, Kunming, 650092, People's Republic of China.|Key Laboratory of Biomass Energy and Environmental Biotechnology, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, 650092, Yunnan Province, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Xiong
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Min
mesh_terms: D002104:Cadmium / Q000633:toxicity*; D018525:Germination / Q000187:drug effects; D011765:Pyruvaldehyde / Q000494:pharmacology*; D036226:Seedlings / Q000187:drug effects / Q000254:growth & development; D014908:Triticum / Q000187:drug effects / Q000254:growth & development / Q000502:physiology*
chemical_list: D002104:Cadmium; D011765:Pyruvaldehyde
keywords: Cadmium tolerance; Cadmium toxicity; Methylglyoxal; N-acetyl-L-cysteine