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Assessment of seed- and seedling-related traits in Santalum album (Indian sandalwood) reveals high adaptive potential

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Abstract

Seed and seedling traits govern plant fitness and persistence and are influenced by the interaction between the plant and its environment. Changing climatic and edaphic conditions will drastically affect early fitness-related traits and can alter the demography and species distribution range. It is widely documented that trait variation among populations may increase resilience of tree communities and reduce the risk of extinction under future climates. In the present study, variation in seed and seedling traits were documented from seven populations of Santalum album representing the natural distribution range of the species in the Indian subcontinent. Significant intra-specific variation was documented in seed and seedling traits, indicating high adaptive potential of the species. Further, the measured traits were correlated with climatic variables. No significant correlation was predicted for seed-related traits, while seedling-related traits like shoot and root weight, photochemical reflectance index, relative water content, and root–shoot ratio correlated with different climatic parameters. Variance partitioning revealed predominant combined effect of environment and genotype on seed traits except seed weight, which was governed by genotypic effect. The dominance of genotypic effect was documented for all seed leachate parameters, while seedling-related traits were predominantly affected by the environment. Conservation of sandalwood genetic resources will benefit from the insights gained from the variability recorded in these fitness-related traits, which are likely to affect the adaptive potential of the species.

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge Dr. Nanita Berry, ICFRE-Tropical Forest Research Institute, Jabalpur, India, and Prof. Ramakrishna Hegde, College of Forestry, Ponnampet, Karnataka, India, for providing sandalwood seeds. The state forest departments of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Odisha are gratefully acknowledged for facilitating the field surveys.

Funding

This research was funded by the Department of Biotechnology, Government of India (Grant Number BT/PR29193/FCB/125/10/2018), and Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Government of India, under the scheme ‘Strengthening Forestry Research for Ecological Sustainability and Productivity Enhancement’.

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  1. ICFRE-Institute of Forest Genetics and Tree Breeding, R.S. Puram, Coimbatore, 641002, India

    Chandramouli K Madhuvanthi, Muthulakshmi Eswaran, Thangaraj Karthick, Aiyar Balasubramanian & Modhumita Ghosh Dasgupta

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  1. Chandramouli K Madhuvanthi
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Contributions

MKC conducted the nursery experiments and data analysis, and prepared the draft manuscript. ME conducted field survey and assisted in data analysis. KT and BA conducted the field surveys and collected seed samples. KT assisted in nursery studies. MGD conceived the study and finalized the manuscript. All authors approved the final version.

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Correspondence to Modhumita Ghosh Dasgupta.

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Corresponding editor: Agepati Raghavendra

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Madhuvanthi, C.K., Eswaran, M., Karthick, T. et al. Assessment of seed- and seedling-related traits in Santalum album (Indian sandalwood) reveals high adaptive potential. J Biosci 49, 13 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12038-023-00397-5

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