Root Halotropism? Salinity Effects on Kochia (Basia indica) Roots

Roots are responsible for the acquisition of nutrients and water from the soil, and possess an important role in establishing plant tolerance to stress conditions. Roots control their growth orientation by displaying differential growth (i.e. a tropism) in response to environmental cues such as gravity. Gravitropic responses are widely studied; however other tropisms in roots have not been studied extensively. Salinity is a major environmental stress for plants. Our observations on root architecture of Basia Indica (Kochia) offer that roots may exhibit tropism cued by salinity ("halotropism"). We found B. indica roots in the field growing horizontally towards saline soil. In our greenhouse experiments we created soil salinity gradient in pots and measured its effect on B. indica plants