Mechanistic examination of causes for narrow distribution in an endangered shrub: a comparison of its responses to drought stress with a widespread congeneric species

Although deep rooting is usually considered a drought-tolerant trait, we found that Syringapinnatifolia, a deep rooting and hydrotropic shrub, has a limited distribution in arid areas. To elucidate the mechanisms for its narrow distribution, we conducted two experiments to examine the physiological and morphological responses to water availability and heterogeneity in S. pinnatifolia and a widespread congeneric species, S. oblata. We measured gas exchange, water use efficiency, and plasticity index in plants of these two species grown at different levels of soil water regimes and in containers with patched water distribution. Our results showed that high photosynthetic capacity in the narrowly distributed S. pinnatifolia was an important factor enabling its survival in the harsh sub-alpine environment. High photosynthetic capacity in S. pinnatifolia, however, was obtained at the expense of high transpiratory water loss, resulting in lower integrative water use efficiency. Biomass allocation to roots in S. pinnatifolia increased by 73 % when soil water increased from 75 to 95 % field capacity, suggesting that S. pinnatifolia could be less competitive for above-ground resources under favorable water regimes. The horizontal root hydrotropism and vertical root hydrotropism of S. pinnatifolia in soil with patched water patterns were likely related to compensation for leaf water loss at low soil water level, indicating a limited capacity for homeostasis within the plant for water conservation and lower level of inherent drought-tolerance. In summary, greater degree of morphological plasticity but lower degree of physiological adjustment may be the main causes for the hydrotropism and narrow distribution of S. pinnatifolia in the sub-alpine habitats

Design and optimization of dispersion-flattened microarray-core fiber with ultralow loss for terahertz transmission

The paper establishes a late-model of microarray-core based polymer optical fiber with flattened dispersion and ultra-low losses. Its transmission properties are calculated by virtue of the beam propagation approach. From the simulation results, it finds that the modelled fiber has a near-zero dispersion property of 0.29 ± 0.16 ps/THz/cm in a frequency area of 1.05 THz to 1.78 THz, a high birefringence of 1.6 × 10-3, an ultra-low confinement loss of 3.78 × 10-10 dB/m, an effective mode field zone of 4.6 × 105 μm2, and a nonlinear coefficient of 1.2 km-1·W−1. With these good properties, the modelled fiber could be applied for ethanol detection and polarization maintaining THz applications