
Zeno VaraniniUniversity of Verona | UNIVR · Department of Biotechnology
Zeno Varanini
Professor
About
173
Publications
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Introduction
Zeno Varanini currently works at the Department of Biotechnology, University of Verona. Zeno does research in Agricultural Plant Science. He has a wide experience in the field of plant nutrition with particular emphasis on the mechanisms taking place at the root-soil interface in nutritional processes.
Additional affiliations
October 1986 - March 1987
November 1987 - October 1990
October 1978 - October 1987
Publications
Publications (173)
Plasma membrane H+-ATPase was studied in maize (Zea mays L.) roots induced for NO3- uptake. Membrane vesicles were isolated by means of Suc density gradient from roots exposed for 24 h either to 1.5 mM NO3- or 1.5 mM SO4-. The two populations of vesicles had similar composition as shown by diagnostic inhibitors of membrane-associated ATPases. Howev...
The ability of Fe-deficient cucumber plants to use iron complexed to a water-extractable humic substances fraction (WEHS),
was investigated. Seven-day-old Fe-deficient plants were transferred to a nutrient solution supplemented daily for 5 days
with 0.2 μM Fe as Fe-WEHS (5 μg org. C mL-1), Fe-EDTA, Fe-citrate or FeCl3. These treatments all allowed...
The induction, i.e., the rapid increase of nitrate (NO3–) uptake following the exposure of roots to the anion, was studied integrating physiological and molecular levels in maize roots. Responses to NO3– treatment were characterized in terms of changes in NO3– uptake rate and plasma membrane (PM) H⁺-ATPase activity and related to transcriptional an...
Phosphorous and iron are a macro- and micronutrient, respectively, whose low bioavailability can negatively affect crop productivity. There is ample evidence that the use of conventional P and Fe fertilizers has several environmental and economical disadvantages, but even though great expectations surround nanotechnology and its applications in the...
The application of synthetic Fe-chelates stands for the most established agronomical practice to alleviate lime-induced chlorosis, which still constitutes a major agronomic problem. However, the percolation through the soil profile due to the negative charge of the most deployed molecules results in agronomical and environmental problems. H2bpcd/Fe...
Plant‐derived biostimulants have gained attention in agricultural practices for their potential to enhance crop quality and resilience. In this study, we investigated the effects of applying a maize gluten‐derived protein hydrolysate at the soil level in vineyards on berry quality in a table grape variety, the Black Magic early table grapevine, dur...
A fully mechanistic dynamical model for plant nitrate uptake is presented. Based on physiological and regulatory pathways and based on physical laws, we form a dynamic system mathematically described by seven differential equations. The model evidences the presence of a short‐term positive feedback on the high‐affinity nitrate uptake, triggered by...
Protein hydrolysates (PHs) are plant biostimulants consisting of oligopeptides and free amino acids exploited in agriculture to increase crop productivity. This work aimed to fractionate a commercial collagen-derived protein hydrolysate (CDPH) according to the molecular mass of the peptides and evaluate the bioactivity of different components. Firs...
A search of the term biostimulants on the most renowned scientific online databases such as Web of Science results in more than one thousand documents. Although some reviews have been previously published, there is no unified and comprehensive bibliometric review of the scientific literature related to biostimulants. This study examines the scienti...
Animal-derived hydrolyzed protein has a long history of usage as plant growth enhancer and biostimulant. Worldwide, hydrolyzed protein products represent the third biostimulant category by market size after seaweed extracts and humic substances. Hydrolyzed protein can be produced from either animal by-products, and nonanimal raw materials and by-pr...
This work investigates an innovative process to valorise agricultural digestate by the exploitation of solar energy. Digestate has been located in a lab-scale greenhouse to evaporate the liquid phase. Digestate vapours, rich in ammonia, are sent in a Drechsler trap, filled with 38% w/w sulfuric acid solution, through three solar air fans. A concent...
The low bioavailability of nutrients, especially nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P), is one of the most limiting factors for crop production. In this study, under N- and P-free nutrient solution (-N-P), nodulating white lupin plants developed some nodules and analogous cluster root structures characterized by different morphological, physiological, an...
Nitrogen deficiency and drought stress are among the major stresses faced by plants with negative consequence on crop production. The use of plant biostimulants is a very promising application in agriculture to improve crop yield, but especially to prevent the effect of abiotic stresses. Algae-derived biostimulants represent an efficient tool to st...
Protein hydrolysates (PHs) are a class of plant biostimulants used in the agricultural practice to improve crop performance. In this study, we have assessed the capacity of a commercial PH derived from bovine collagen to mitigate drought, hypoxic, and Fe deficiency stress in Zea mays. As for the drought and hypoxic stresses, hydroponically grown pl...
In several cultivation areas, grapevine can suffer from Fe chlorosis due to the calcareous and alkaline nature of soils. This plant species has been described to cope with Fe deficiency by activating Strategy I mechanisms, hence increasing root H+ extrusion and ferric-chelate reductase activity. The degree of tolerance exhibited by the rootstocks h...
Nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) of crops is estimated to be less than 50%, with a strong impact on environment and economy. Genotype-dependent ability to cope with N shortage has been only partially explored in maize and, in this context, the comparison of molecular responses of lines with different NUE is of particular interest in order to dissect t...
Nanomaterials are widely used in medical and pharmaceutical fields, but their application in plant nutrition is at its infancy. Phosphorous (P) and iron (Fe) are essential mineral nutrients limiting in a wide range of conditions the yield of crops. Phosphate and Fe fertilizers to-date on the market display low efficiency (P fertilizers) and low per...
Improvement of plant iron nutrition as a consequence of metal complexation by humic substances (HS) extracted from different sources has been widely reported. The presence of humified fractions of the organic matter in soil sediments and solutions would contribute, depending on the solubility and the molecular size of HS, to build up a reservoir of...
Background
Magnesium (Mg) deficiency causes physiological and molecular responses, already dissected in several plant species. The study of these responses among genotypes showing a different tolerance to the Mg shortage can allow identifying the mechanisms underlying the resistance to this nutritional disorder. To this aim, we compared the physiol...
Aim
The rate of nitrate (NO3⁻) uptake and changes in rhizosphere properties were studied growing seedlings of two maize inbred lines differing in nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) in rhizoboxes.
Results
Changes in NO3⁻ uptake rates occurred in response to anion addition (induction) in seedlings grown both in hydroponic culture and in soil in rhizoboxe...
Humic substances are known to positively influence plant growth and nutrition. In particular, the water-extractable fraction of humic substances (WEHS) has been shown to enhance nitrate acquisition, increasing the activity of high affinity nitrate uptake system. However, molecular bases of this physiological response are not clarified so far.
Thus,...
Coumarin is one of the simplest plant secondary metabolites, widely distributed in the plant kingdom, affecting root form and function, including anatomy, morphology and nutrient uptake. Although, some plant responses to coumarin have been described, comprehensive knowledge of the physiological and molecular mechanisms is lacking.
Maize seedlings e...
The determination of food geographical origin has been an important subject of study over the past decade, with an increasing number of analytical techniques being developed to determine the provenance of agricultural products. Agricultural soils can differ for the composition and the relative quantities of mineral nutrients and trace elements whos...
Protein hydrolysates are an emerging class of crop management products utilized for improving nutrient assimilation and mitigating crop stress. They generally consist of a mixture of peptides and free amino acids derived from the hydrolysis of plant or animal sources. The present work was aimed at studying the effects and the action mechanisms of a...
Protein hydrolysates are an emerging class of crop management products utilized for improving nutrient assimilation and mitigating crop stress. They generally consist of a mixture of peptides and free amino acids derived from the hydrolysis of plant or animal sources. The present work was aimed at studying the effects and the action mechanisms of a...
Background
Under limited iron (Fe) availability maize, a Strategy II plant, improves Fe acquisition through the release of phytosiderophores (PS) into the rhizosphere and the subsequent uptake of Fe-PS complexes into root cells. Occurrence of Strategy-I-like components and interactions with phosphorous (P) nutrition has been hypothesized based on m...
To limit nitrogen (N) losses from the soil, it has been suggested to provide urea to crops in conjunction with the urease inhibitor N-(n-butyl) thiophosphoric triamide (NBPT). However, recent studies reported that NBPT affects urea uptake and urease activity in plants. To shed light on these latter aspects, the effects of NBPT were studied analysin...
MapMan Mapping File. Transcript mapping file for the pathway of urea assimilation and primary metabolism.
MapMan Mapping File. Transcript mapping file for the pathway of phenylalanine/tyrosine derivatives.
MapMan Pathway file. Image file for the pathway of urea assimilation and primary metabolism without transcript bins.
Overview of up- (red) and down- (green) modulated transcripts in Urea+NBPT vs. Urea using MapMan-bincode classification. Numbers refer to the MapMan bincode: 1, PS; 2, major CHO metabolism; 3, minor CHO metabolism; 4, glycolysis; 5, fermentation; 6, gluconeogenesis/glyoxylate cycle; 7, OPP; 8, TCA/org transformation; 9, mitochondrial electron trans...
Real-time RT-PCR validation of a set of genes differentially expressed in microarray analysis Urea+NBPT vs. Urea. In the table are shown (starting from left column): Number of transcript according to Tables 2–4, Supplementary Table 4, transcript ID, description, gene symbol, microarray value (fold change and p. value adj.), real-time RT-PCR values...
Differentially expressed transcripts resulted by the comparison of root transcriptional profiles of Urea+NBPT plants with root transcriptional profile of Urea plants (Urea+NBPT vs. Urea comparison). In the table are shown (starting from left column): transcript ID, fold change (FC) of Urea+NBPT vs. Urea, adjusted P-value of Urea+NBPT vs. Urea, gene...
MapMan Pathway file. Image file for the pathway of phenylalanine/tyrosine derivatives without transcript bins, image adapted from Tohge et al. (2013).
Background: It is well known that in the rhizosphere soluble Fe sources available for plants are mainly represented by a mixture of complexes between the micronutrient and organic ligands such as carboxylates and phytosiderophores (PS) released by roots, as well as fractions of humified organic matter. The use by roots of these three natural Fe sou...
Despite the widespread use of urease inhibitors in agriculture, little information is available on their effect on nitrogen (N) uptake and assimilation. Aim of this work was to study, at physiological and transcriptional level, the effects of N-(n-butyl) thiophosphoric triamide (NBPT) on urea nutrition in hydroponically grown maize plants. Presence...
Background and AimsNitrate is a major form of inorganic nitrogen present in cultivated soils; however, information on the mechanisms responsible for uptake of the anion in grapevines is scarce.Methods and ResultsThe response to external nitrate was studied in two clones of the cultivars Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc. Grapevines, own-rooted or graf...
Even if urea and nitrate are the two major nitrogen (N) forms applied as fertilizers in agriculture and occur concomitantly in soils, the reciprocal influence of these two N sources on the mechanisms of their acquisition are poorly understood. Therefore, molecular and physiological aspects of urea and nitrate uptake were investigated in maize (Zea...
Aims
Study of the changes in soil microbial biomass, enzyme activity and the microbial community structure in the rhizosphere of two contrasting maize lines differing in the nitrogen use efficiency (NUE).
Methods
The Lo5 and T250 inbred maize characterized by high and low NUE, respectively, were grown in rhizoboxes allowing precise sampling of rhiz...
Plants mainly rely on a mixture of Fe complexes
with different organic ligands, like carboxylates and soluble
fractions of water-extractable humic substances (WEHSs), to
sustain the supply of this micronutrient. It has been demonstrated
that the Fe-WEHS complex is more efficiently acquired
by plant roots as it enhances functionality of the mechanis...
In higher plants, NO3- can induce its own uptake and the magnitude of this induction is positively related to the external anion concentration. This phenomenon has been characterized both in herbaceous and woody plants. Here, different adaptation strategies of roots from two maize inbred lines differing in NUE and exhibiting different timing of ind...
The phenomenon of NO3– induction in plant roots has been characterised both in herbaceous and woody plants. Grapevine (Vitis vinifera L.) plants, hydroponically grown, showed an increase in NO3– uptake rate in response to anion treatment for different periods in the nutrient solution after 1 week of NO3– deprivation. The expression profile of the t...
Cadmium (Cd) detoxification involves glutathione and phytochelatins biosynthesis: the higher need of nitrogen should require increased nitrate (NO(3) (-)) uptake and metabolism. We investigated inducible high-affinity NO(3) (-) uptake across the plasma membrane (PM) in maize seedlings roots upon short exposure (10 min to 24 h) to low Cd concentrati...
The mechanisms by which nitrate is transported into the roots have been characterized both at physiological and molecular levels. It has been demonstrated that nitrate is taken up in an energy-dependent way by a four-component uptake machinery involving high- and low- affinity transport systems. In contrast very little is known about the physiology...
Plants react to iron deficiency stress adopting different kind of adaptive responses. Tomato, a Strategy I plant, improves iron uptake through acidification of rhizosphere, reduction of Fe3+ to Fe2+ and transport of Fe2+ into the cells. Large-scale transcriptional analyses of roots under iron deficiency are only available for a very limited number...
Primer sequences of Real-time RT-PCR experiment. TC ID, description and sequences of forward and reverse primers are reported.
Functional annotation of 97 differentially expressed transcripts. ProbeID. Fold change. adjusted p-value. reference Tentative Consensus sequence in DFCI Tomato Gene Index (Release 12.0) http://compbio.dfci.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/tgi/gimain.pl?gudb=tomato. description. UniProtID http://www.uniprot.org/. Biological process GO term and E-value are report...
The aim of this work is to evaluate the capability of tomato plants to use different Fe sources, such as Fe citrate, Fe phytosiderophores, and Fe complexed by a water-extractable humic substances (Fe-WEHS) also in relation to physiological and molecular adaptations induced by these complexes at the root level. Tomato plants acquired higher amounts...