Arundo donax L. is a high performing crop species for biomass production being tolerant to a wide range of environmental stresses and suitable to growth on marginal lands.
In order to test the possibility to exploit A. donax for biomass production in degraded soils, we deepened the investigation on the mechanisms involved in the response of A. donax to the exposure of combined high concentrations of Na+ and P in the soil.
Arundo plants were grown in 5 different nutrient condition: C, control condition; -P, low phosphorous supply; +P, excess supply of phosphorous; +Na, excess supply of sodium chloride; +NaP, with excess supply of both phosphorous and sodium chloride. RNA sequencing through Illumina NextSeq 500 was conducted on first leaves from the top of the plants collected after 43 days of treatment. De novo transcriptome assembly, analysis of differentially expressed genes and functional annotations were performed. Less...