Deactivation of aquaporins decreases internal conductance to CO2 diffusion in tobacco leaves grown under long-term drought.

We compared the diffusion conductance to CO2 from the intercellular air space to the chloroplasts (internal conductance (g i)) between tobacco leaves acclimated to long-term drought (drought-acclimated (DA)) and those grown under sufficient irrigation (well-watered (WW)), and analysed the changes in g i in relation to the leaf anatomical characteristics and a possible CO2 transporter, aquaporin. The g i, which was estimated by combined analyses of CO2 gas exchange with chlorophyll fluorescence, in the DA plants was approximately half of that in the WW plants. The mesophyll and chloroplast surface areas exposing the intercellular air space, which potentially affect g i, were not significantly different between the WW and DA plants. The amounts of plasma membrane aquaporins (PIP), immunochemically determined using radish PIP antibodies, were unrelated to g i. After treatment with HgCl2, an aquaporin inhibitor, the water permeability of the leaf tissues (measured as the weight loss of fully-turgid leaf disks without the abaxial epidermis in 1 m sorbitol) in WW plants decreased with an increase in HgCl2 concentration. The g i in the WW plants decreased to similar levels to the DA plants when the detached leaflets were fed with 0.5 mm HgCl2. In contrast, both water permeability and g i were insensitive to HgCl2 treatments in DA plants. These results suggest that deactivation of aquaporins is responsible for the significant reduction in g i observed in plants growing under long-term drought.