Miao Bian;Meixue Zhou;Dongfa Sun;Chengdao L

Tasmanian Institute of Agriculture, University of Tasmania, P.O. Box 46, Kings Meadows, Tas 7249, Australia; Department of Agriculture & Food WA, 3 Baron-Hay Court, South Perth, WA 6155, Australia;Tasmanian Institute of Agriculture, University of Tasmania, P.O. Box 46, Kings Meadows, Tas 7249, Australia;College of Plant Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, Hubei 430070, China;Department of Agriculture & Food WA, 3 Baron-Hay Court, South Perth, WA 6155, Australi

Soil acidity;Aluminum;Marker-assisted selection;Mechanism;CONTROLLING ALUMINUM TOLERANCE;SOYBEAN GLYCINE-MAX;TRITICUM-AESTIVUM L;QUANTITATIVE TRAIT LOCI;ROOT-GROWTH;GENOTYPIC DIFFERENCES;MALATE TRANSPORTERS;ACTIVATED CITRATE;GENETIC-ANALYSIS;ABC TRANSPORTE

Acid soil is a worldwide problemto plant production. Acid toxicity is mainly caused by a lack of essential nutrients in the soil and excessive toxic metals in the plant root zone. Of the toxic metals, aluminum (Al) is the most prevalent and most toxic. Plant species have evolved to variable levels of tolerance to aluminum enabling breeding of high Al-tolerant cultivars. Physiological and molecular approaches have revealed some mechanisms of Al toxicity in higher plants. Mechanisms of plant tolerance to Al stress include: 1) exclusion of Al from the root tips, and 2) absorbance, but tolerance of Al in root cells. Organic acid exudation to chelate Al is a feature shared by many higher plants. The future challenge for Al tolerance studies is the identification of novel tolerance mechanisms and the combination of different mechanisms to achieve higher tolerance. Molecular approaches have led to significant progress in explaining mechanisms and detection of genes responsible for Al tolerance. Gene-specific molecular markers offer better options for marker-assisted selection in breeding programs than linked marker strategies. This paper mainly focuses on recent progress in the use of molecular approaches in Al tolerance research. Crown Copyright (C) 2013 Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of Crop Science Society of China and Institute of Crop Science, CAAS. All rights reserved.