Ploidy level in the genus Leucanthemum correlates with resistance to a specialist herbivore
- Stutz, Sonja CABI, Delémont, Switzerland - Unit of Ecology and Evolution, Department of Biology, University of Fribourg, Switzerland
- Hinz, Hariet L. CABI, Delémont, Switzerland
- Konowalik, Kamil Evolutionary and Systematic Botany Group, Institute of Plant Sciences, University of Regensburg, Germany - Institute of Biology, Wrocław University of Environmental and Life Sciences, Wrocław, Poland
- Müller-Schärer, Heinz Unit of Ecology and Evolution, Department of Biology, University of Fribourg, Switzerland
- Oberprieler, Christoph Evolutionary and Systematic Botany Group, Institute of Plant Sciences, University of Regensburg, Germany
- Schaffner, Urs CABI, Delémont, Switzerland
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01.09.2016
Published in:
- Ecosphere. - 2016, vol. 7, no. 9, p. e01460
English
Polyploidy is considered to be a major source of genetic diversity in plants. Genome duplication has been shown repeatedly to be associated with changes in biotic interactions, but little is known about whether species traits such as herbivore resistance consistently change with increasing ploidy level among closely related plant species. We tested whether larval survival and performance of the specialist root- mining moth Dichrorampha aeratana are influenced by the ploidy level of plant species in the genus Leucanthemum by experimentally infesting 16 different taxa with ploidy levels ranging from diploid to dodecaploid. We found that survival of D. aeratana larvae consistently decreased with increasing ploidy level, irrespective of whether phylogenetic distance among taxa was taken into account or not. The mass of larvae and the proportion of adults emerging from last-instar larvae, however, did not consistently change with increasing ploidy level. Root biomass and dry matter content of the Leucanthemum taxa were neither correlated with ploidy level nor correlated with survival or mass of D. aeratana larvae. In summary, our results provide evidence that in the genus Leucanthemum, resistance to the specialist root herbivore D. aeratana consistently increases with increasing plant ploidy level, but it remains unclear which characteristics associated with polyploidy account for the higher herbivore resistance.
- Faculty
- Faculté des sciences et de médecine
- Department
- Département de Biologie
- Language
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- English
- Classification
- Biological sciences
- License
- License undefined
- Identifiers
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- RERO DOC 278418
- DOI 10.1002/ecs2.1460
- Persistent URL
- https://folia.unifr.ch/unifr/documents/305154
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