Revisiting Sulphur—The Once Neglected Nutrient: It’s Roles in Plant Growth, Metabolism, Stress Tolerance and Crop Production

Tinashe Zenda, Songtao Liu, Anyi Dong and Huijun Duan
Additional contact information
Tinashe Zenda: State Key Laboratory of North China Crop Improvement and Regulation, Hebei Agricultural University, Baoding 071001, China
Songtao Liu: State Key Laboratory of North China Crop Improvement and Regulation, Hebei Agricultural University, Baoding 071001, China
Anyi Dong: State Key Laboratory of North China Crop Improvement and Regulation, Hebei Agricultural University, Baoding 071001, China
Huijun Duan: State Key Laboratory of North China Crop Improvement and Regulation, Hebei Agricultural University, Baoding 071001, China

Agriculture, 2021, vol. 11, issue 7, 1-24

Abstract: Sulphur plays crucial roles in plant growth and development, with its functions ranging from being a structural constituent of macro-biomolecules to modulating several physiological processes and tolerance to abiotic stresses. In spite of these numerous sulphur roles being well acknowledged, agriculture has paid scant regard for sulphur nutrition, until only recently. Serious problems related to soil sulphur deficiencies have emerged and the intensification of food, fiber, and animal production is escalating to feed the ever-increasing human population. In the wake of huge demand for high quality cereal and vegetable diets, sulphur can play a key role in augmenting the production, productivity, and quality of crops. Additionally, in light of the emerging problems of soil fertility exhaustion and climate change-exacerbated environmental stresses, sulphur assumes special importance in crop production, particularly under intensively cropped areas. Here, citing several relevant examples, we highlight, in addition to its plant biological and metabolism functions, how sulphur can significantly enhance crop productivity and quality, as well as acclimation to abiotic stresses. By this appraisal, we also aim to stimulate readers interests in crop sulphur research by providing priorities for future pursuance, including bettering our understanding of the molecular processes and dynamics of sulphur availability and utilization in plants, dissecting the role of soil rhizospherical microbes in plant sulphur transformations, enhancing plant phenotyping and diagnosis for nutrient deficiencies, and matching site-specific crop sulphur demands with fertilizer amendments in order to reduce nutrient use inefficiencies in both crop and livestock production systems. This will facilitate the proper utilization of sulphur in crop production and eventually enhance sustainable and environmentally friend food production.

Keywords: sulphur; crop productivity; crop quality; sulphate transporters; secondary sulphur compounds; abiotic stress tolerance; crop production (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q1 Q10 Q11 Q12 Q13 Q14 Q15 Q16 Q17 Q18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/11/7/626/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/11/7/626/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jagris:v:11:y:2021:i:7:p:626-:d:588153

Access Statistics for this article

Agriculture is currently edited by Ms. Leda Xuan

More articles in Agriculture from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().