Fruit Crop Physiological and Metabolic Responses to Challenging Environments

Dear Colleagues,

The current drastic global climate change and deterioration of agro-ecological environments, such as seasonal drought, osmotic stress, extreme temperatures and high-intensity UV radiation, have seriously affected crop development and the stability and sustainability of agricultural production. As an important economic crop, the development, flavor and nutritional qualities of fruit crops are also affected by challenging environments. However, they can continuously adapt to adversity by regulating their physiological and metabolic changes to maintain their growth and quality. As plants with reproductive organs as edible tissues, the response and adaptation mechanisms of fruit crops to challenging environments are unique compared to model plants such as Arabidopsis and rice, which involve complex and precise regulatory mechanisms that require systematic and in-depth study. Fruit crops respond to challenging environments with intensity and time effects, short and appropriate stress environments can induce the expression of a series of resistance response-related genes and epigenetic modifications，including DNA methylation and histone modification, to achieve memory of the stress environment and enhance its resistance. Elucidating the physiological and metabolic responses of fruit to challenging environments and exploring the molecular mechanisms behind them will help us to enhance the stress resistance of fruit crops through scientific agricultural management and advanced cultivation techniques, which in turn will improve their yield and quality.

We are pleased to invite you to submit your relevant research findings, or your reviews on the progress, problems, and future priorities in this field, to our Special Issue of “Fruit Crop Physiological and Metabolic Responses to Challenging Environments”.

This Special Issue aims to focus on the response and adaptation of fruit crops to challenging environments, including the effects of environmental stresses, such as seasonal drought, osmotic stress, extreme temperatures, high-intensity UV irradiation, etc., on the growth, development, and fruit quality of fruit crops at the level of physiology and metabolism; the response and adaptation mechanisms of fruit crops to challenging environments at the level of hormones, transcription, proteins, and epigenetics; and the roles and mechanisms of cultivation techniques and management measures in improving the resilience of fruit crops. The research in this Special Issue will provide an important reference for us to cope with various environmental challenges in agricultural production, and also provide a theoretical basis for the cultivation of fruit tree varieties with high stress tolerance.

In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews are welcome. Research areas may include (but are not limited to) the following:

• The physiological and metabolic effects of the challenging environments (drought, saline and alkaline osmotic stress, extreme temperatures, high-intensity UV irradiation, etc.) on fruit crop development, fruit flavor, and nutritional quality;
• To study the response and adaptation mechanisms of fruit crops to challenging environments using metabolomic, transcriptomic, proteomic, and epigenomic analysis;
• The differences in the adaptability of fruit crops to challenging environments between cultivars and geographical regions and the molecular mechanisms underlying these differences;
• The role and mechanisms of adaptive training or cultivation and management practices in improving stress resistance in fruit crops.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Xiangmei Cao
Prof. Dr. Qingfeng Niu
Dr. Hongru Liu
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Plants is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• challenging environments
• fruit development
• flavor and nutritional quality
• physiological responses
• metabolic response