Polyphenol composition of Sematophyllum adnatum cultivated at Instituto de Biociencias of University of São Paulo

• Grant number: 18/08742-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: July 01, 2018
• End date: June 30, 2019
• Field of knowledge: Biological Sciences - Botany
• Principal Investigator: Cláudia Maria Furlan
• Grantee: Ana Paula Felici de Camargo
• Host Institution: Instituto de Biociências (IB). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Plants in natural ecosystems develop several strategies to cope with biotic and abiotic conditions of the environment. Being sessile organisms, most of these strategies involve the production of chemical compounds, called secondary metabolites. They act as an interface between the plant and the environment and increasing its performance. In the last century, human-induced climate change has culminated in new environmental impositions for these plants, creating a need to understand how these organisms react to such changes. Understanding how species in natural ecosystems respond to biotic and abiotic stresses is as important as understanding how species is genetically limited crops respond to these same factors. As one of the first groups of plants to colonize the terrestrial environment, mosses have developed, from their secondary metabolism, key adaptation mechanisms to cope with the climate and other stress factors present in this environment. In this context, this project, in collaboration with researchers across botany, ecology and chemistry from the University of Wollongong (Australia), aims analyze the composition of metabolites produced by mosses and to understand how this secondary defense metabolism evolved from one of the basal groups of terrestrial plants to the flowering plants. Understanding the phylogeny of these secondary plant metabolites will provide vital information on which plants have the most capacity to adapt to the globally changing climate. This proposal aims to analyze and compare the polyphenol composition of mosses from the species Sematophyllum adnatum occurring in the Atlantic Rain Forest and Brazilian Central Savannah. This will be the first subside to answer two main questions: do phenolic compounds act as a defense mechanism in all main groups of terrestrial plants? And, do plants from different phytogeographic domains and different phylogenetic levels respond to environmental stress by activating the same chemical defenses?