Summary
During the dry season in the Negev desert (Israel) Artemisia herbaalba in its natural habitat has a very low water content. It shows values of negative hydrostatic pressure in the xylem down to -163 bars and an extreme of osmotic potential in the leaves of -92 bars. The diurnal water stress does not decrease strongly in the night. Under these conditions Artemisia is still photosynthetically active for a few hours of the day during the whole dry period.
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Kappen, L., Lange, O.L., Schulze, E.D. et al. Extreme water stress and photosynthetic activity of the desert plant Artemisia herba-alba asso. Oecologia 10, 177–182 (1972). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00347989
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00347989