Leaf Senescence: The Moral Process Of Leaf Senescence

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Senescence is the age-dependent deterioration process at the cellular, tissue, organ, or organismal level, leading to death or the end of the life span (Nooden, 1988). Leaf senescence is an organ level senescence but is often intimately associated with cellular or organismal death (Lim et al., 2007). According to Betania et al. (2000), it is the last stage of leaf development. The senescence process is started by the breakdown of chloroplast (Gepstein, 2004). Next, it is followed by macromolecules catabolism for example nucleic acids, proteins, and lipids (Ulker et al., 1997). Final stage for leaf senescence is the degradation of mitochondria and nuclei (Gan and Amasino, 1997; Lim et al., 2007). Nutrients released by leaf senescence for example nitrogen, phosphorus, and minerals will be invested to younger leaves and growing seeds, or are stored for the next growing season and it can be viewed that as a recycling program at the organismal level (Betania et al., 2000). …show more content…

On the other hand, senescence process including senescence rate and molecular nature is influenced by various environmental and internal factors (Lim et al., 2007). The internal factors influencing leaf senescence includes phytohormones such as cytokinins, ethylene, auxin, JA, ABA, and SA, while the external factors includes UV rays , nutrient limitation, temperature, drought, shading, and pathogen attach or wounding. It can be said that to form a complex network of regulatory pathways for senescence, there should be an existence of various pathways responding to several external and internal factors all the pathways should be interconnected (He et al., 2001). Having said that, leaf senescence should be an excellently regulated process, taking into account its potential role in plants health and the various factors involved in senescence control (Lim et al.,

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