An abrupt increase in foliage ABA levels on incipient leaf death occurs across vascular plants.

Forest mortality during drought has been attributed to hydraulic failure, which can be challenging to measure. A limited number of alternative proxies for incipient leaf death exist. Here we investigate whether a terminal increase in abscisic acid (ABA) levels in leaves occurs across vascular land plants and is an indicator of imminent leaf death. For different species across vascular plants, we monitored ABA levels during lethal drought as well as leaf embolism resistance, across the canopy as leaves die following senescence, or when leaves are exposed to a heavy, lethal frost late in the growing season. We observed a considerable increase in foliage ABA levels once leaves showed signs of incipient leaf death. This increase in ABA levels upon incipient leaf death, could be induced by embolism during drought, by freezing or as leaves age naturally, and was observed in species spanning the phylogeny of vascular land plants as well as in an ABA biosynthetic mutant plant. A considerable increase in foliage ABA levels may act as an indicator of impending leaf death.