| ORIGINAL ARTICLE |
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Background: Invasive alien species
(IAS) are broadly distributed all over the world by disturbing or
reducing the growth and development of native vegetation. Lantana camara is basically a
noxious weed and have a potential to invade a region's indigenous
vegetation. Even after knowing all its harmful effects, there has been
a little research on various mechanisms followed by this plant to harm
the plant species.
Results: Random sampling was
performed to take plant samples without any bias, to study various
mechanisms carried out in plant species. Chemical fingerprinting of
samples were then performed in various abiotic stress conditions (cold
and hot) to study changes in L.
camara under these stressful conditions in order to find the
reason behind the invasiveness of this plant species. Stress indicator
like malondialdehyde (MDA)/lipid peroxidation was also performed and
increased lipid peroxidation during both extremities showed that plant
is experiencing oxidative stress. ROS imaging was performed on the
leaves of L. camara, which
also showed rise in ROS staining during extreme conditions. Elevated
peaks (major and minor) and detection of secondary metabolites like
glycine betaine in chemical fingerprinting observed under stressful
conditions showed that plant may produce some increased level of
metabolites in stress conditions that might play a role in minimizing
the oxidative stress that plant is facing.
Conclusions: On the behalf of
obtained results, it can be assumed that Lantana camara has the capability
to survive in or tolerate extreme environmental abiotic stress
conditions by producing or agglomerating various stress-reducing
metabolites.
