Imaging Salt Transport in Plants Using PET: A Feasibility Study

The ability to image salt transport in plants is currently limited to techniques that either destroy the plant or offer compromised spatial information. PET has the potential to provide a 3-D map of the salt distribution in the plant at different time points and hence provide precise dynamic information. This study reports on the study of salt transport in crops using the radionuclide 22 Na. A total of 24 plants from two genotypes of green-foxtail millet were incubated with 22 NaCl for 14 days and imaged at 5 different time points. PET images showed a clear increase of 22 Na uptake over time. The two genotypes presented significantly different behaviors at two of the time points. This study concludes that PET has the potential to become a unique tool to study salt transport dynamics in intact plants.