The Nitrogen Contribution of Different Plant Parts to Wheat Grains: Exploring Genotype, Water, and Nitrogen Effects

The flag leaf has been traditionally considered as the main contributor to grain nitrogen. However, during the reproductive stage, other organs besides the flag leaf may supply nitrogen to developing grains. Therefore, the contribution of the ear and other organs to the nitrogen supplied to the growing grains remains unclear. It is important to develop phenotypic tools to assess the relative contribution of different plant parts to the N accumulated in the grains of wheat which may helps to develop genotypes that use N more efficiently. We studied the effect of growing conditions (different levels of water and nitrogen in the field) on the nitrogen contribution of the spike and different vegetative organs of the plant to the grains. The natural abundance of δ(15)N and total N content in the flag blade, peduncle, whole spike, glumes and awns were compared to the δ(15)N and total N in mature grains to trace the origin of nitrogen redistribution to the grains. The δ(15)N and total N content of the different plant parts correlated positively with the δ(15)N and total N content of mature grains suggesting that all organs may contribute a portion of their N content to the grains. The potential contribution of the flag blade to grain N increased (by 46%) as the growing conditions improved, whereas the potential contribution of the glumes plus awns and the peduncle increased (46 and 31%, respectively) as water and nitrogen stress increased. In general, potential contribution of the ear providing N to growing grains was similar (42%) than that of the vegetative parts of the plants (30–40%), regardless of the growing conditions. Thus, the potential ear N content could be a positive trait for plant phenotyping, especially under water and nitrogen limiting conditions. In that sense, genotypic variability existed at least between old (tall) and modern (semidwarf) cultivars, with the ear from modern genotypes exhibiting less relative contribution to the total grain N. The combined use of δ(15)N and N content may be used as an affordable tool to assess the relative contribution of different plant parts to the grain N in wheat.