Acclimatization of Cotton Exposed to High-Temperature Stress

Abiotic stress accounts for a large proportion of total harvest yield losses every year. Like any plant, cotton must adapt accordingly to the conditions at hand and likewise mitigate possible future effects. High-temperature stress is commonly experienced across the Mississippi river delta regions of Arkansas multiple times during the season. Higher temperatures above a critical threshold do generally correlate with decreased yields (Oosterhuis et al., 2000; Bibi et al., 2008). However, what has not been sufficiently investigated is the speed at which modern cultivars can adapt to changing conditions in the field. Therefore, the objective for this study was to examine possible acclimation of cotton to high-temperature stress using established screening techniques for temperature tolerance of membrane leakage and fluorescence.