Aik Is Involved In The Functional Analysis Of Arabidopsis Thaliana Potassium Absorption

K~+ is one of the three essential cations in the cytoplasm of plant and plays a key role in plant growth and development. Potassium in the soil is the largest source, but potassium deficiency in soil has become an inportant factor limiting the development of the agricultural production in China and the world. Different species or between different varieties of the same species have differenct potassium nutrition efficiency, and such differences can be genetic. Increasing potassium-efficiency of plant is one of the promising ways to overcome the contradiction between potash fertilizer supply and demand.In this study, the phenotype was examined among the wild type, mutant and overexpressing lines. In MS medium, overexpressing lines showed smaller shoots and lighter weight than wild type and mutant, and the weight and potassium content are also lower than wild type and mutant. In 400μM K~+ medium, the roots of overexpressing lines have more growth advantage than wild type and mutant, and the the weight of overexpressing lines is higher than wide type, but the potassium content is lower. Potassium absorption kinetics experiments also showed that: the absorptive capacity of overexpressing lines is worse than wild-type and mutant plants. These results indicated that in a wide range of external K~+ concentration, the overexpression of AIK has a negative impact on the absorption of potassium.