Clarification of the metabolic mechanisms underlying salt stress
responses in plants will allow further optimization of crop breeding and
cultivation to obtain high yields in salinealkali land. Here, we
characterized 68 differential metabolites of cultivated soybean (Glycine
max) and wild soybean (Glycine soja) under neutral-salt and alkali-salt
stresses using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS)-based
metabolomics, to reveal the physiological
and molecular differences in salt tolerance. According to comparisons
of growth parameters under the two kinds of salt stresses, the level of
inhibition in wild soybean was lower than in cultivated soybean,
especially under alkali-salt stress. Moreover, wild soybean contained
significantly higher amounts of phenylalanine, asparagine, citraconic
acid, citramalic acid, citric acid and α-ketoglutaric acid under
neutral-salt stress, and higher amounts of palmitic acid, lignoceric
acid, glucose, citric acid and α-ketoglutaric acid under alkali-salt
stress, than cultivated soybean. Further investigations demonstrated
that the ability of wild soybean to salt tolerance was mainly based on
the synthesis of organic and amino acids, and the more active
tricarboxylic acid cycle under neutral-salt stress. In addition, the
metabolite profiling analysis suggested that the energy generation from
β-oxidation, glycolysis and the citric acid cycle plays important roles
under alkali-salt stress. Our results extend the understanding of
mechanisms involved in wild soybean salt tolerance and provide an
important reference for increasing yields and developing salt-tolerant
soybean cultivars.