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Kathleen Donohue

Kathleen Donohue

Professor of Biology
Biology
Box 90338, Durham, NC 27708-0338
130 Science Drive, Room 226, Duke Box 90338, Durham, NC 27708
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Selected Publications

Thank You to Our 2023 Peer Reviewers

Journal Article Geophysical Research Letters · May 16, 2024 On behalf of the journal, AGU, and the scientific community, the editors of Geophysical Research Letters would like to sincerely thank those who reviewed manuscripts for us in 2023. The hours reading and commenting on manuscripts not only improve the manus ... Full text Cite

Climate and plant traits alter the relationship between seed dispersal and seed dormancy in alpine environment

Journal Article Environmental and Experimental Botany · March 1, 2024 Species employ seed dispersal and dormancy to mitigate competition and extinction risks in uncertain environments. Theoretical insights suggest a trade-off in that efficiently dispersed species tend to exhibit lower seed dormancy. This trade-off is hypothe ... Full text Cite

Changes in phenology can alter patterns of natural selection: the joint evolution of germination time and postgermination traits.

Journal Article The New phytologist · April 2023 The timing of a developmental transition (phenology) can influence the environment experienced by subsequent life stages. When phenology causes an organism to occupy a particular habitat as a consequence of the developmental cues used, it can act as a form ... Full text Cite

Parental methylation mediates how progeny respond to environments of parents and of progeny themselves.

Journal Article Annals of botany · December 2022 Background and aimsEnvironments experienced by both parents and offspring influence progeny traits, but the epigenetic mechanisms that regulate the balance of parental vs. progeny control of progeny phenotypes are not known. We tested whether DNA ... Full text Cite

Parental DNA methylation influences plasticity of early offspring traits, but offspring DNA methylation influences trait plasticity throughout life

Journal Article Ecology and Evolution · August 1, 2022 Plants alter their phenotypes in response to both their own environment and that of their parents. Parental environments are hypothesized to more strongly regulate early life stages of offspring, while offspring environments regulate later life stages, sin ... Full text Cite

The effect of seed-dispersal timing on seedling recruitment is modulated by environmental conditions that vary across altitude in a threatened palm.

Journal Article Annals of botany · July 2022 Background and aimsThe timing of seed dispersal determines the environmental conditions that plants face during early life stages. In seasonal environments, selection is expected to favour dispersal timing that is matched to environmental conditio ... Full text Cite

Genetic Consequences of Biologically Altered Environments.

Journal Article The Journal of heredity · February 2022 Evolvable traits of organisms can alter the environment those organisms experience. While it is well appreciated that those modified environments can influence natural selection to which organisms are exposed, they can also influence the expression of gene ... Full text Cite

Genetic differences in the temporal and environmental stability of transgenerational environmental effects.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · November 2021 Environments influence the expression of phenotypes of individuals, their progeny, and even their grandprogeny. The duration of environmental effects and how they are modified by subsequent environments are predicted to be targets of natural selection in v ... Full text Cite

Effects of environment, life-history and phylogeny on germination strategy of 789 angiosperms species on the eastern Tibetan Plateau

Journal Article Ecological Indicators · October 1, 2021 Germination strategies vary widely among species and significantly influence individual fitness and community diversity. Germination strategies are known to be influenced by environmental conditions, life-history traits and evolutionary history, but how th ... Full text Cite

Elevation filters seed traits and germination strategies in the eastern Tibetan Plateau

Journal Article Ecography · February 1, 2021 Featured Publication Seeds are the colonizing propagules for many plants and may therefore contribute to the filtering of species during the process of colonization and community assembly. Environmental filtering of seed traits may occur among species and influence community c ... Full text Cite

Genotypic variation in the persistence of transgenerational responses to seasonal cues.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · October 2020 Phenotypes respond to environments experienced directly by an individual, via phenotypic plasticity, or to the environment experienced by ancestors, via transgenerational environmental effects. The adaptive value of environmental effects depends not only o ... Full text Cite

Pleiotropy in developmental regulation by flowering-pathway genes: is it an evolutionary constraint?

Journal Article The New phytologist · October 2019 Pleiotropy occurs when one gene influences more than one trait, contributing to genetic correlations among traits. Consequently, it is considered a constraint on the evolution of adaptive phenotypes because of potential antagonistic selection on correlated ... Full text Cite

Can the Environment have a Genetic Basis? A Case Study of Seedling Establishment in Arabidopsis thaliana.

Journal Article The Journal of heredity · July 2019 The timing of seed germination determines the environment experienced by a plant's most vulnerable life stage-the seedling. Germination is environmentally cued, and genotypes can differ in their sensitivity to environmental cues. When genotypes differ in t ... Full text Cite

Effects of maternal source and progeny microhabitat on natural selection and population dynamics in Alliaria petiolata.

Journal Article American journal of botany · June 2019 PremiseThe success or failure of propagules in contrasting microhabitats may play a role in biological invasion. We tested for variation in demographic performance and phenotypic trait expression during invasion by Alliaria petiolata in different ... Full text Cite

Multi-tasking as an ancient skill: When one gene does many things well.

Journal Article Molecular ecology · March 2019 Multi-tasking is in our DNA. Many genes perform more than one function, and the question is how well it can do them all. Pleiotropy is frequently considered to be an adaptive constraint that prevents optimal phenotypes from evolving because of antagonistic ... Full text Cite

The Snail's Charm.

Journal Article The American naturalist · February 2019 In 2017, The American Naturalist celebrated its 150th anniversary. It was founded as a journal of natural history, yet it developed into an important vehicle of the evolutionary synthesis. During the early years of the journal and through much of the twent ... Full text Cite

Within- and trans-generational plasticity: seed germination responses to light quantity and quality.

Journal Article AoB PLANTS · June 2018 Plants respond not only to the environment in which they find themselves, but also to that of their parents. The combination of within- and trans-generational phenotypic plasticity regulates plant development. Plants use light as source of energy and also ... Full text Open Access Cite

PHYD prevents secondary dormancy establishment of seeds exposed to high temperature and is associated with lower PIL5 accumulation.

Journal Article Journal of experimental botany · May 2018 Dormancy cycling controls the seasonal conditions under which seeds germinate, and these conditions strongly influence growth and survival of plants. Several endogenous and environmental signals affect the dormancy status of seeds. Factors such as time, li ... Full text Cite

Genetics of dispersal.

Journal Article Biological reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society · February 2018 Dispersal is a process of central importance for the ecological and evolutionary dynamics of populations and communities, because of its diverse consequences for gene flow and demography. It is subject to evolutionary change, which begs the question, what ... Full text Cite

The autonomous flowering-time pathway pleiotropically regulates seed germination in Arabidopsis thaliana.

Journal Article Annals of botany · January 2018 Background and aimsTwo critical developmental transitions in plants are seed germination and flowering, and the timing of these transitions has strong fitness consequences. How genetically independent the regulation of these transitions is can inf ... Full text Cite

Thank You to Our 2023 Peer Reviewers

Journal Article Geophysical Research Letters · May 16, 2024 On behalf of the journal, AGU, and the scientific community, the editors of Geophysical Research Letters would like to sincerely thank those who reviewed manuscripts for us in 2023. The hours reading and commenting on manuscripts not only improve the manus ... Full text Cite

Climate and plant traits alter the relationship between seed dispersal and seed dormancy in alpine environment

Journal Article Environmental and Experimental Botany · March 1, 2024 Species employ seed dispersal and dormancy to mitigate competition and extinction risks in uncertain environments. Theoretical insights suggest a trade-off in that efficiently dispersed species tend to exhibit lower seed dormancy. This trade-off is hypothe ... Full text Cite

Changes in phenology can alter patterns of natural selection: the joint evolution of germination time and postgermination traits.

Journal Article The New phytologist · April 2023 The timing of a developmental transition (phenology) can influence the environment experienced by subsequent life stages. When phenology causes an organism to occupy a particular habitat as a consequence of the developmental cues used, it can act as a form ... Full text Cite

Parental methylation mediates how progeny respond to environments of parents and of progeny themselves.

Journal Article Annals of botany · December 2022 Background and aimsEnvironments experienced by both parents and offspring influence progeny traits, but the epigenetic mechanisms that regulate the balance of parental vs. progeny control of progeny phenotypes are not known. We tested whether DNA ... Full text Cite

Parental DNA methylation influences plasticity of early offspring traits, but offspring DNA methylation influences trait plasticity throughout life

Journal Article Ecology and Evolution · August 1, 2022 Plants alter their phenotypes in response to both their own environment and that of their parents. Parental environments are hypothesized to more strongly regulate early life stages of offspring, while offspring environments regulate later life stages, sin ... Full text Cite

The effect of seed-dispersal timing on seedling recruitment is modulated by environmental conditions that vary across altitude in a threatened palm.

Journal Article Annals of botany · July 2022 Background and aimsThe timing of seed dispersal determines the environmental conditions that plants face during early life stages. In seasonal environments, selection is expected to favour dispersal timing that is matched to environmental conditio ... Full text Cite

Genetic Consequences of Biologically Altered Environments.

Journal Article The Journal of heredity · February 2022 Evolvable traits of organisms can alter the environment those organisms experience. While it is well appreciated that those modified environments can influence natural selection to which organisms are exposed, they can also influence the expression of gene ... Full text Cite

Genetic differences in the temporal and environmental stability of transgenerational environmental effects.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · November 2021 Environments influence the expression of phenotypes of individuals, their progeny, and even their grandprogeny. The duration of environmental effects and how they are modified by subsequent environments are predicted to be targets of natural selection in v ... Full text Cite

Effects of environment, life-history and phylogeny on germination strategy of 789 angiosperms species on the eastern Tibetan Plateau

Journal Article Ecological Indicators · October 1, 2021 Germination strategies vary widely among species and significantly influence individual fitness and community diversity. Germination strategies are known to be influenced by environmental conditions, life-history traits and evolutionary history, but how th ... Full text Cite

Elevation filters seed traits and germination strategies in the eastern Tibetan Plateau

Journal Article Ecography · February 1, 2021 Featured Publication Seeds are the colonizing propagules for many plants and may therefore contribute to the filtering of species during the process of colonization and community assembly. Environmental filtering of seed traits may occur among species and influence community c ... Full text Cite

Genotypic variation in the persistence of transgenerational responses to seasonal cues.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · October 2020 Phenotypes respond to environments experienced directly by an individual, via phenotypic plasticity, or to the environment experienced by ancestors, via transgenerational environmental effects. The adaptive value of environmental effects depends not only o ... Full text Cite

Pleiotropy in developmental regulation by flowering-pathway genes: is it an evolutionary constraint?

Journal Article The New phytologist · October 2019 Pleiotropy occurs when one gene influences more than one trait, contributing to genetic correlations among traits. Consequently, it is considered a constraint on the evolution of adaptive phenotypes because of potential antagonistic selection on correlated ... Full text Cite

Can the Environment have a Genetic Basis? A Case Study of Seedling Establishment in Arabidopsis thaliana.

Journal Article The Journal of heredity · July 2019 The timing of seed germination determines the environment experienced by a plant's most vulnerable life stage-the seedling. Germination is environmentally cued, and genotypes can differ in their sensitivity to environmental cues. When genotypes differ in t ... Full text Cite

Effects of maternal source and progeny microhabitat on natural selection and population dynamics in Alliaria petiolata.

Journal Article American journal of botany · June 2019 PremiseThe success or failure of propagules in contrasting microhabitats may play a role in biological invasion. We tested for variation in demographic performance and phenotypic trait expression during invasion by Alliaria petiolata in different ... Full text Cite

Multi-tasking as an ancient skill: When one gene does many things well.

Journal Article Molecular ecology · March 2019 Multi-tasking is in our DNA. Many genes perform more than one function, and the question is how well it can do them all. Pleiotropy is frequently considered to be an adaptive constraint that prevents optimal phenotypes from evolving because of antagonistic ... Full text Cite

The Snail's Charm.

Journal Article The American naturalist · February 2019 In 2017, The American Naturalist celebrated its 150th anniversary. It was founded as a journal of natural history, yet it developed into an important vehicle of the evolutionary synthesis. During the early years of the journal and through much of the twent ... Full text Cite

Within- and trans-generational plasticity: seed germination responses to light quantity and quality.

Journal Article AoB PLANTS · June 2018 Plants respond not only to the environment in which they find themselves, but also to that of their parents. The combination of within- and trans-generational phenotypic plasticity regulates plant development. Plants use light as source of energy and also ... Full text Open Access Cite

PHYD prevents secondary dormancy establishment of seeds exposed to high temperature and is associated with lower PIL5 accumulation.

Journal Article Journal of experimental botany · May 2018 Dormancy cycling controls the seasonal conditions under which seeds germinate, and these conditions strongly influence growth and survival of plants. Several endogenous and environmental signals affect the dormancy status of seeds. Factors such as time, li ... Full text Cite

Genetics of dispersal.

Journal Article Biological reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society · February 2018 Dispersal is a process of central importance for the ecological and evolutionary dynamics of populations and communities, because of its diverse consequences for gene flow and demography. It is subject to evolutionary change, which begs the question, what ... Full text Cite

The autonomous flowering-time pathway pleiotropically regulates seed germination in Arabidopsis thaliana.

Journal Article Annals of botany · January 2018 Background and aimsTwo critical developmental transitions in plants are seed germination and flowering, and the timing of these transitions has strong fitness consequences. How genetically independent the regulation of these transitions is can inf ... Full text Cite

The fitness benefits of germinating later than neighbors.

Journal Article American journal of botany · January 2018 Premise of the studyPhenology, the seasonal timing of development, can alter biotic interactions. Emergence from dormant or quiescent stages often occurs earlier when neighbors are present, which may reduce the neighbors' competitive effects. Dela ... Full text Cite

Canalization of Seasonal Phenology in the Presence of Developmental Variation: Seed Dormancy Cycling in an Annual Weed.

Journal Article Integrative and comparative biology · November 2017 Variation in the developmental timing in one life stage may ramify within and across generations to disrupt optimal phenology of other life stages. By focusing on a common mechanism of developmental arrest in plants-seed dormancy-we investigated how variat ... Full text Cite

Understanding Evolutionary Impacts of Seasonality: An Introduction to the Symposium.

Journal Article Integrative and comparative biology · November 2017 Seasonality is a critically important aspect of environmental variability, and strongly shapes all aspects of life for organisms living in highly seasonal environments. Seasonality has played a key role in generating biodiversity, and has driven the evolut ... Full text Cite

Adjusting phenotypes via within- and across-generational plasticity.

Journal Article The New phytologist · October 2017 Contents 343 I. 343 II. 343 III. 347 IV. 348 348 References 348 SUMMARY: There is renewed interest in how transgenerational environmental effects, including epigenetic inheritance, contribute to adaptive evolution. The contribution of across-generation pla ... Full text Cite

Maternal vernalization and vernalization-pathway genes influence progeny seed germination.

Journal Article The New phytologist · October 2017 Different life stages frequently respond to the same environmental cue to regulate development so that each life stage is matched to its appropriate season. We investigated how independently each life stage can respond to shared environmental cues, focusin ... Full text Cite

Divergence in How Genetic Pathways Respond to Environments.

Journal Article Trends in plant science · October 2017 An upstream gene in the pathway that induces flowering in response to cold has been identified. The gene, RVR1, occurs in several plant lineages and operates in a pathway that exhibits functional divergence across development and across taxa. Such divergen ... Full text Cite

Effects of pre- and post-dispersal temperature on primary and secondary dormancy dynamics in contrasting genotypes of A rabidopsis thaliana (Brassicaceae)

Journal Article Plant Species Biology · July 1, 2017 Germination is determined by the depth of primary dormancy and the dynamics of secondary dormancy induction. We assess how dark imbibition at cool temperatures influences primary dormancy breakage and secondary dormancy induction, and how the depth of prim ... Full text Cite

Effect of FLOWERING LOCUS C on seed germination depends on dormancy.

Journal Article Functional plant biology : FPB · May 2017 FLOWERING LOCUS C (FLC) has a major regulatory role in the timing of flowering in Arabidopsis thaliana (L.) Heynh. and has more recently been shown to influence germination. Here, we investigated the conditions under which FLC influences germination, and d ... Full text Cite

Photoperiod throughout the maternal life cycle, not photoperiod during seed imbibition, influences germination in Arabidopsis thaliana.

Journal Article American journal of botany · April 2017 Premise of the studyPlants adjust their phenology in response to seasonal cues experienced both by their parents and by themselves, and coordinating responses to these cues is necessary for expressing adaptive phenology. We investigated how cues a ... Full text Cite

Interpreting variation in dormancy and germination time under diverse seasonal conditions

Journal Article INTEGRATIVE AND COMPARATIVE BIOLOGY · March 1, 2017 Link to item Cite

The evolution of intrinsic reproductive isolation in the genus Cakile (Brassicaceae).

Journal Article Journal of evolutionary biology · February 2017 In theory, adaptive divergence can increase intrinsic post-zygotic reproductive isolation (RI), either directly via selection on loci associated with RI, or indirectly via linkage of incompatibility loci with loci under selection. To test this hypothesis, ... Full text Cite

Contrasting germination responses to vegetative canopies experienced in pre- vs. post-dispersal environments.

Journal Article Annals of botany · November 2016 BackgroundSeeds adjust their germination based on conditions experienced before and after dispersal. Post-dispersal cues are expected to be more accurate predictors of offspring environments, and thus offspring success, than pre-dispersal cues. Th ... Full text Cite

Hybridization can facilitate species invasions, even without enhancing local adaptation.

Journal Article Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · September 2016 The founding population in most new species introductions, or at the leading edge of an ongoing invasion, is likely to be small. Severe Allee effects-reductions in individual fitness at low population density-may then result in a failure of the species to ... Full text Cite

Maternal temperature effects on dormancy influence germination responses to water availability in Arabidopsis thaliana

Journal Article Environmental and Experimental Botany · June 1, 2016 With climate change, germination cuing to water availability is expected to be especially important for seedling survival. Here, we examined germination responses to low water potential and tested whether dormancy status mediates these responses. We consid ... Full text Cite

Genotype-by-Environment Interaction

Chapter · April 14, 2016 The ability of a genotype to alter its phenotype in response to the environment is called phenotypic plasticity. When different genotypes exhibit different responses to an environmental factor (i.e., exhibit different plastic responses), there is a genotyp ... Full text Cite

Multiple paths to similar germination behavior in Arabidopsis thaliana.

Journal Article The New phytologist · February 2016 Germination timing influences plant fitness, and its sensitivity to temperature may cause it to change as climate shifts. These changes are likely to be complex because temperatures that occur during seed maturation and temperatures that occur post-dispers ... Full text Cite

Secondary dormancy dynamics depends on primary dormancy status in Arabidopsis thaliana

Journal Article Seed Science Research · June 8, 2015 Seed dormancy can prevent germination under unfavourable conditions that reduce the chances of seedling survival. Freshly harvested seeds often have strong primary dormancy that depends on the temperature experienced by the maternal plant and which is grad ... Full text Cite

DOG1-imposed dormancy mediates germination responses to temperature cues

Journal Article Environmental and Experimental Botany · April 1, 2015 Seed dormancy and environment-dependent germination requirements interact to determine the timing of germination in natural environments. This study tested the contribution of the dormancy gene Delay Of Germination 1 (DOG1) to primary and secondary dormanc ... Full text Cite

Applying developmental threshold models to evolutionary ecology.

Journal Article Trends in ecology & evolution · February 2015 Process-based models of development predict developmental rates and phenology as a function of physiological responses to multiple dynamic environmental factors. These models can be adapted to analyze diverse processes in evolutionary ecology. By linking m ... Full text Cite

Modeling the influence of genetic and environmental variation on the expression of plant life cycles across landscapes.

Journal Article The American naturalist · February 2015 Organisms develop through multiple life stages that differ in environmental tolerances. The seasonal timing, or phenology, of life-stage transitions determines the environmental conditions to which each life stage is exposed and the length of time required ... Full text Cite

Recipient of the 2014 molecular ecology prize: Johanna Schmitt.

Journal Article Molecular ecology · January 2015 Full text Cite

Diversification and the evolution of dispersal ability in the tribe Brassiceae (Brassicaceae).

Journal Article Annals of botany · December 2014 Background and aimsDispersal and establishment ability can influence evolutionary processes such as geographic isolation, adaptive divergence and extinction probability. Through these population-level dynamics, dispersal ability may also influence ... Full text Cite

The evolution of seed dormancy: environmental cues, evolutionary hubs, and diversification of the seed plants.

Journal Article The New phytologist · July 2014 Seed dormancy, by controlling the timing of germination, can strongly affect plant survival. The kind of seed dormancy, therefore, can influence both population and species-level processes such as colonization, adaptation, speciation, and extinction. We us ... Full text Cite

Gene duplication and the environmental regulation of physiology and development.

Journal Article Ecology and evolution · June 2014 When different life stages have different environmental tolerances, development needs to be regulated so that each life stage experiences environmental conditions that are suitable for it, if fitness is to be maintained. Restricting the timing of developme ... Full text Cite

The epigenetics of adaptation: focusing on epigenetic stability as an evolving trait.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · March 2014 Full text Cite

Why ontogeny matters during adaptation: developmental niche construction and pleiotorpy across the life cycle in Arabidopsis thaliana.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · January 2014 This case study of adaptation in Arabidopsis thaliana shows that natural selection on early life stages can be intense and can influence the evolution of subsequent traits. Two mechanisms contribute to this influence: pleiotropy across developmental stages ... Full text Cite

Local adaptation and plasticity of Erysimum capitatum to altitude: Its implications for responses to climate change

Journal Article Journal of Ecology · May 1, 2013 Alpine plants are at high risk because of climate change. Assessing the performance of alpine plant species across different altitudes is useful for predicting how they may respond to changing climate. Adaptation and plasticity of early life stages are of ... Full text Cite

Pleiotropy in the wild: the dormancy gene DOG1 exerts cascading control on life cycles.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · March 2013 In the wild, organismal life cycles occur within seasonal cycles, so shifts in the timing of developmental transitions can alter the seasonal environment experienced subsequently. Effects of genes that control the timing of prior developmental events can t ... Full text Cite

Development in the Wild: Phenotypic Plasticity

Chapter · November 27, 2012 Development of organisms in the wild occurs in ecologically variable environments. Phenotypic plasticity occurs when a single genotype alters its phe-notype in response to its environment. Some traits are more plastic than others, and whether a particular ... Full text Cite

Understanding the basis of a novel fruit type in Brassicaceae: conservation and deviation in expression patterns of six genes.

Journal Article EvoDevo · September 2012 UnlabelledBackgroundVariation in fruit morphology is important for plant fitness because it influences dispersal capabilities. Approximately half the members of tribe Brassiceae (Brassicaceae) exhibit fruits with segmentation and variable ... Full text Cite

Longitudinal trends in climate drive flowering time clines in North American Arabidopsis thaliana.

Journal Article Ecology and evolution · June 2012 Introduced species frequently show geographic differentiation, and when differentiation mirrors the ancestral range, it is often taken as evidence of adaptive evolution. The mouse-ear cress (Arabidopsis thaliana) was introduced to North America from Eurasi ... Full text Cite

Maternal effects alter natural selection on phytochromes through seed germination

Journal Article Journal of Ecology · May 1, 2012 Phytochromes regulate seed germination in response to light and temperature, and different phytochromes contribute to germination under different environmental conditions. Using Arabidopsis thaliana mutants with different combinations of non-functional phy ... Full text Cite

Seed after-ripening and dormancy determine adult life history independently of germination timing.

Journal Article The New phytologist · May 2012 • Seed dormancy can affect life history through its effects on germination time. Here, we investigate its influence on life history beyond the timing of germination. • We used the response of Arabidopsis thaliana to chilling at the germination and flowerin ... Full text Cite

The effect of plant architecture on drought resistance: Implications for the evolution of semelparity in Erysimum capitatum

Journal Article Functional Ecology · February 1, 2012 Constraints of resource allocation between reproduction and adult survival have been implicated in much life-history variation, yet physiological or functional trade-offs with juvenile survival may be just as important. Here, we examined selection on a juv ... Full text Cite

Natural variation in germination responses of Arabidopsis to seasonal cues and their associated physiological mechanisms.

Journal Article Annals of botany · January 2012 Background and aimsDespite the intense interest in phenological adaptation to environmental change, the fundamental character of natural variation in germination is almost entirely unknown. Specifically, it is not known whether different genotypes ... Full text Cite

Convergent evolution of a complex fruit structure in the tribe Brassiceae (Brassicaceae).

Journal Article American journal of botany · December 2011 Premise of studyMany angiosperms have fruit morphologies that result in seeds from the same plant having different dispersal capabilities. A prime example is found in the Brassiceae (Brassicaceae), which has many members with segmented or heteroar ... Full text Cite

Population differentiation and plasticity in vegetative ontogeny: effects on life-history expression in Erysimum capitatum (Brassicaceae).

Journal Article American journal of botany · November 2011 Premise of the studyDistinguishing the contributions of phenotypic plasticity vs. population differentiation to variation in the life history of plants throughout their range is important for predicting their performance after dispersal or their r ... Full text Cite

Demographic, developmental and life-history variation across altitude in Erysimum capitatum

Journal Article Journal of Ecology · September 1, 2011 1.Natural variation in life history provides the opportunity to examine its correlated population performance. Alpine systems are considered to be vulnerable to climate change as high-altitude conditions are predicted to become more similar to those at low ... Full text Cite

DOG1 expression is predicted by the seed-maturation environment and contributes to geographical variation in germination in Arabidopsis thaliana.

Journal Article Molecular ecology · August 2011 Seasonal germination timing of Arabidopsis thaliana strongly influences overall life history expression and is the target of intense natural selection. This seasonal germination timing depends strongly on the interaction between genetics and seasonal envir ... Full text Cite

Darwin's Finches Readings in the Evolution of a Scientific Paradigm

Book · June 15, 2011 little that David Lack had also debunked another aspect of the legend when, confronted by the historical evidence, he duly acknowledged the apparently slow growth of Darwin's thinking about the finches. Readers and reviewers of Lack's ... ... Cite

Environment-dependent inbreeding depression: its ecological and evolutionary significance.

Journal Article The New phytologist · January 2011 Inbreeding depression is a major evolutionary and ecological force that influences population dynamics and the evolution of inbreeding-avoidance traits such as mating systems and dispersal. There is now compelling evidence that inbreeding depression is env ... Full text Cite

Germination, postgermination adaptation, and species ecological ranges

Journal Article Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics · December 1, 2010 Germination behavior is one of the earliest phenotypes expressed by plants. This fact has several consequences for the evolution of postgermination traits, ecological niches, and geographic ranges. By determining the conditions that plants experience after ... Full text Cite

Relaxed selection in the wild.

Journal Article Trends in ecology & evolution · September 2009 Natural populations often experience the weakening or removal of a source of selection that had been important in the maintenance of one or more traits. Here we refer to these situations as 'relaxed selection,' and review recent studies that explore the ef ... Full text Cite

Major flowering time gene, flowering locus C, regulates seed germination in Arabidopsis thaliana.

Journal Article Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · July 2009 Flowering locus C (FLC) is a major regulator of flowering responses to seasonal environmental factors. Here, we document that FLC also regulates another major life-history transition-seed germination, and that natural variation at the FLC locus and in FLC ... Full text Cite

Completing the cycle: maternal effects as the missing link in plant life histories.

Journal Article Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · April 2009 Maternal effects on seed traits such as germination are important components of the life histories of plants because they represent the pathway from adult to offspring: the pathway that completes the life cycle. Maternal environmental effects on germinatio ... Full text Cite

New roles of phytochromes during seed germination

Journal Article International Journal of Plant Sciences · May 1, 2008 Among the most important environmental sensors in plants are the phytochromes, members of a duplicated-gene family of photoreceptors. We characterized the functional diversification of this gene family with respect to a single ecologically important and hi ... Full text Cite

Pollen competition and environmental effects on hybridization dynamics between Phlox drummondii and Phlox cuspidata

Journal Article Evolutionary Ecology · March 1, 2008 Pollen competition between species strongly influences hybridization dynamics in plants. By performing single- and mixed-donor pollinations, we show that soil Ca alters the outcome of interspecific pollen competition in the annual Phlox hybrid system of Ph ... Full text Cite

Diversification of phytochrome contributions to germination as a function of seed-maturation environment.

Journal Article The New phytologist · January 2008 Environmental conditions during seed maturation influence germination, but the genetic basis of maternal environmental effects on germination is virtually unknown. Using single and multiple mutants of phytochromes, it is shown here that different phytochro ... Full text Cite

Environmental effects on pollen-pistil compatibility between Phlox cuspidata and P. drummondii (Polemoniaceae): Implications for hybridization dynamics

Journal Article American Journal of Botany · February 1, 2007 Postpollination mechanisms of reproductive isolation can critically influence the amount of gene flow between hybridizing species. While much evidence exists for genetically based pollen-pistil incompatibility, we show that environmental variation also inf ... Full text Cite

Phytochrome mediates germination responses to multiple seasonal cues.

Journal Article Plant, cell & environment · February 2007 We identified a new role of phytochrome in mediating germination responses to seasonal cues and thereby identified for the first time a gene involved in maternal environmental effects on germination. We examined the germination responses of a mutant, hy2-1 ... Full text Cite

A new role for phytochromes in temperature-dependent germination.

Journal Article The New phytologist · January 2007 Germination timing is a fundamental life-history trait, as seedling establishment predicates realized fitness in the wild. Light and temperature are two important cues by which seeds sense the proper season of germination. Using Arabidopsis thaliana, we pr ... Full text Cite

Developmental basis of an anatomical novelty: Heteroarthrocarpy in Cakile lanceolata and Erucaria erucarioides (Brassicaceae)

Journal Article International Journal of Plant Sciences · July 1, 2006 To understand the developmental basis of a novel anatomical feature, we present a comparative developmental study of an ecologically significant novelty in fruit morphology. Most members of the tribe Brassiceae have heteroarthrocarpic fruits, in contrast t ... Full text Cite

Seeds and seasons: Interpreting germination timing in the field

Journal Article Seed Science Research · September 1, 2005 This paper discusses how field and laboratory experiments, using a variety of genetic material, can be combined to investigate the genetic basis of germination under realistic ecological conditions, and it reviews some of our recent work on germination phe ... Full text Cite

Genetic basis and consequences of niche construction: plasticity-induced genetic constraints on the evolution of seed dispersal in Arabidopsis thaliana.

Journal Article The American naturalist · May 2005 Because seed dispersal influences the environment experienced by seeds, that environment can change as dispersal evolves. The evolutionary potential of dispersal can in turn change as dispersal evolves, if its expression of genetic variation depends on the ... Full text Cite

Niche construction through phenological plasticity: life history dynamics and ecological consequences.

Journal Article The New phytologist · April 2005 The ability of an organism to alter the environment that it experiences has been termed 'niche construction'. Plants have several ways whereby they can determine the environment to which they are exposed at different life stages. This paper discusses three ... Full text Cite

Environmental and genetic influences on the germination of Arabidopsis thaliana in the field.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · April 2005 Seasonal germination timing strongly influences lifetime fitness and can affect the ability of plant populations to colonize and persist in new environments. To quantify the influence of seasonal environmental factors on germination and to test whether ple ... Full text Cite

The evolutionary ecology of seed germination of Arabidopsis thaliana: variable natural selection on germination timing.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · April 2005 Germination timing of Arabidopsis thaliana displays strong plasticity to geographic location and seasonal conditions experienced by seeds. We identified which plastic responses were adaptive using recombinant inbred lines in a field manipulation of geograp ... Full text Cite

Niche construction through germination cueing: life-history responses to timing of germination in Arabidopsis thaliana.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · April 2005 Germination responses to seasonal conditions determine the environment experienced by postgermination life stages, and this ability has potential consequences for the evolution of plant life histories. Using recombinant inbred lines of Arabidopsis thaliana ... Full text Cite

Density-dependent processes influencing the evolutionary dynamics of dispersal: A functional analysis of seed dispersal in Arabidopsis thaliana (Brassicaceae)

Journal Article American Journal of Botany · January 1, 2005 We conducted a functional analysis of seed dispersal and its plasticity in response to density in Arabidopsis thaliana by growing morphologically diverse ecotypes under high and low density and measuring seed dispersion patterns under controlled conditions ... Full text Cite

Life-history variation and adaptation in the historically mobile plant Arabidopsis thaliana (Brassicaceae) in North America

Journal Article American Journal of Botany · June 1, 2004 We used field-collected seeds of Arabidopsis thaliana (Brassicaceae) to simulate a colonization event of plants from diverse locations into a common environment to compare regionally "local" and "foreign" populations of this historically mobile species. Li ... Full text Cite

Density-dependent multilevel selection in the Great Lakes sea rocket

Journal Article Ecology · January 1, 2004 Multilevel natural selection has been demonstrated in natural plant populations, but the ecological conditions that influence the strength of different levels of selection are poorly known empirically. One of the factors most likely to influence the relati ... Full text Cite

The influence of neighbor relatedness on multilevel selection in the Great Lakes sea rocket.

Journal Article The American naturalist · July 2003 Natural selection can operate at the individual and group level in natural populations. This study investigates the ecological factors that determine the relative importance of individual versus group selection. In particular, it determines how the related ... Full text Cite

Setting the stage: Phenotypic plasticity as habitat selection

Journal Article International Journal of Plant Sciences · January 1, 2003 The ability of plants to sense their environment gives them the capacity to respond to it plastically. Plastic responses, in turn, frequently alter the environment that plants experience. Plants can modify the environment they experience through many mecha ... Full text Cite

Reducing environmental bias when measuring natural selection.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · November 2002 Crucial to understanding the process of natural selection is characterizing phenotypic selection. Measures of phenotypic selection can be biased by environmental variation among individuals that causes a spurious correlation between a trait and fitness. On ... Full text Cite

Population differentiation and natural selection for water-use efficiency in Impatiens capensis (Balsaminaceae)

Journal Article International Journal of Plant Sciences · November 1, 2002 In xeric environments, water-use efficiency (WUE) is likely to be a target of natural selection. Higher WUE is expected to confer a fitness advantage in drought conditions, but this prediction has rarely been tested. To examine the relationships between WU ... Full text Cite

Germination timing influences natural selection on life-history characters in Arabidopsis thaliana

Journal Article Ecology · April 1, 2002 An experimental manipulation of germination timing was conducted to test whether germination timing influences the phenotypic expression of postgermination life-history characteristics and whether it alters natural selection on those characters. Seeds coll ... Full text Cite

Adaptive divergence in plasticity in natural populations of Impatiens capensis and its consequences for performance in novel habitats.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · April 2001 We tested for adaptive differentiation between two natural populations of Impatiens capensis from sites known to differ in selection on plasticity to density. We also determined the degree to which plasticity to density within a site was correlated with pl ... Full text Cite

The effect of maternal photoperiod on seasonal dormancy in Arabidopsis thaliana (Brassicaceae)

Journal Article American Journal of Botany · January 1, 2001 The maternal photoperiod at the time of seed maturation can predict the seasonal conditions of newly dispersed seeds. We investigated the effects of maternal photoperiod on seasonal dormancy in Arabidopsis thaliana using a set of F6 recombinant inbred line ... Full text Cite

Quantitative modelling to predict candidates for outpatient blood and/or marrow transplantation (BMT)

Journal Article Blood · December 1, 2000 There are no quantitative models identifying candidates for outpatient BMT. This study's objective was to determine if pre-transplant characteristics could define good and poor outpatient BMT candidates. We retrospectively reviewed 234 consecutive inpatien ... Cite

Density dependence and population differentiation of genetic architecture in Impatiens capensis in natural environments.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · December 2000 We identified environment-dependent constraints on the evolution of plasticity to density under natural conditions in two natural populations of Impatiens capensis. We also examined the expression of population divergence in genetic variance-covariance mat ... Full text Cite

Evidence of adaptive divergence in plasticity: density- and site-dependent selection on shade-avoidance responses in Impatiens capensis.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · December 2000 We investigated the conditions under which plastic responses to density are adaptive in natural populations of Impatiens capensis and determined whether plasticity has evolved differently in different selective environments. Previous studies showed that a ... Full text Cite

Effects of the past and the present on species distribution: Land-use history and demography of wintergreen

Journal Article Journal of Ecology · May 15, 2000 1. Past land use can have long-term effects on plant species' distributional patterns if alterations in resources and environmental conditions have persistent effects on population demography (environmental change) and/or if plants are intrinsically limite ... Full text Cite

Seed dispersal as a maternally influenced character: Mechanistic basis of maternal effects and selection on maternal characters in an annual plant

Journal Article American Naturalist · December 1, 1999 Maternal influences on progeny characters affect phenotypic correlations between characters expressed in maternal and progeny generations and consequently influence evolutionary responses to selection. Net selection on maternally influenced characters depe ... Full text Cite

The genetic architecture of plasticity to density in Impatiens capensis

Journal Article Evolution · January 1, 1999 Plant responses to crowding may be mediated by resource availability and/or by a specific environmental cue, the ratio of red:far red wavelengths (R:FR) perceived by phytochrome. This study examined the contribution of phytochrome-mediated photomorphogenes ... Full text Cite

Maternal determinants of seed dispersal in Cakile edentula: Fruit, plant, and site traits

Journal Article Ecology · January 1, 1998 Seed dispersion patterns are largely determined by the maternal plant. Characters of the progeny, such as dispersal, that are determined by the maternal parent and that vary with the maternal environment are said to exhibit maternal environmental effects. ... Full text Cite

Effects of inbreeding on traits that influence dispersal and progeny density in Cakile edentula var. lacustris (Brassicaceae)

Journal Article American Journal of Botany · January 1, 1998 Inbreeding may influence the intensity of sibling competition by altering the number of offspring produced or by changing plant morphology in ways that influence seed dispersion patterns. To test this possibility, effects of inbreeding on seed production a ... Full text Cite

Seed dispersal in Cakile edentula var. lacustris: Decoupling the fitness effects of density and distance from the home site

Journal Article Oecologia · May 1, 1997 A factorial design of three densities of siblings at three local distances from seed parents was employed to distinguish effects of density from effects of dispersal distance on lifespan and fruit production of Cakile edentula var. lacustris, a plant with ... Full text Cite

Adaptation at specific loci. VI. Divergence vs. parallelism of polymorphic allozymes in molecular function and fitness-component effects among Colias species (Lepidoptera, Pieridae)

Journal Article Molecular Biology and Evolution · January 1, 1996 In lowland Colias butterflies, genotypes of the enzyme phosphoglucose isomerase (PGI) show major differences in molecular function, from which genotypic differences in organismal performance and fitness components in the wild are accurately predictable. Th ... Full text Cite

The spatial demography of mistletoe parasitism on a Yemeni Acacia

Journal Article International Journal of Plant Sciences · December 1, 1995 Full text Cite

Females' choice of "good genotypes" as mates is promoted by an insect mating system.

Journal Article Science (New York, N.Y.) · September 1986 Can animal mating systems result in the choice of mates carrying genotypes that are otherwise favored by natural selection? This question is addressed by studying, in natural populations of Colias butterflies, how the phosphoglucose isomerase (PGI) enzyme ... Full text Cite