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Aims <p>Altitude gradients integrate multiple environmental constraints and shape plant adaptive strategies, yet how soil salinity along altitudinal gradients reshapes cuticular wax structure remains unclear.</p> Methods <p>Here, the desert shrub <i>Haloxylon ammodendron</i> from the Qaidam Basin was investigated by integrating soil physicochemical properties, leaf cuticular wax metabolomics, and transcriptomics along an altitudinal gradient.</p> Results <p>Soil salinity and soil moisture were identified as the environmental factors most strongly associated with altitude. Increasing salinity along the gradient was significantly linked to extensive remodeling of wax metabolism and gene expression. Cuticular wax composition showed pronounced chain-length restructuring, with significant enrichment of C30 and C31 alkanes and a monotonic increase in the weighted average carbon chain length with altitude. Integrated transcriptomic and metabolomic analyses indicated that coordinated fatty acid elongation, modification, and alkane biosynthesis drove the preferential accumulation of long-chain alkanes. Partial least squares path modeling further revealed that soil salinity serves as the primary mediator linking altitude with wax biosynthetic gene modules and wax structural traits.</p> Conclusions <p>These findings suggest that altitude-associated soil salinity reshapes cuticular wax carbon chain structure through transcriptional regulation, representing an important structural strategy for desert plant adaptation to coupled water—salt stress.</p>

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Altitude-associated soil salinization reshapes cuticular wax biosynthesis and carbon chain length in the desert shrub Haloxylon ammodendron

  • 期刊论文

  • 发表日期：

    2026年7月20日

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  • Xunchao Zhang,
  • Shengyun Wang,
  • Ruitao Wu,
  • Xiaochong Liu,
  • Jie Wang,
  • Yubi Zhou

摘要

Aims

Altitude gradients integrate multiple environmental constraints and shape plant adaptive strategies, yet how soil salinity along altitudinal gradients reshapes cuticular wax structure remains unclear.

Methods

Here, the desert shrub Haloxylon ammodendron from the Qaidam Basin was investigated by integrating soil physicochemical properties, leaf cuticular wax metabolomics, and transcriptomics along an altitudinal gradient.

Results

Soil salinity and soil moisture were identified as the environmental factors most strongly associated with altitude. Increasing salinity along the gradient was significantly linked to extensive remodeling of wax metabolism and gene expression. Cuticular wax composition showed pronounced chain-length restructuring, with significant enrichment of C30 and C31 alkanes and a monotonic increase in the weighted average carbon chain length with altitude. Integrated transcriptomic and metabolomic analyses indicated that coordinated fatty acid elongation, modification, and alkane biosynthesis drove the preferential accumulation of long-chain alkanes. Partial least squares path modeling further revealed that soil salinity serves as the primary mediator linking altitude with wax biosynthetic gene modules and wax structural traits.

Conclusions

These findings suggest that altitude-associated soil salinity reshapes cuticular wax carbon chain structure through transcriptional regulation, representing an important structural strategy for desert plant adaptation to coupled water—salt stress.