Adaptive plasticity in response to light and nutrient availability in the clonal plantDuchesnea indica

Abstract

Aims Phenotypic plasticity enables plants to buffer against environmental stresses and match their phenotypes to local conditions. However, consistent conclusive evidence for adaptive plasticity has only been obtained for a few traits. More studies on a wider variety of plant functional traits and environmental factors are still needed to further understand the adaptive significance of plasticity. Methods We grew 21 genotypes of the stoloniferous clonal plant Duchesnea indica under different light and nutrient conditions, and used selection gradient analyses to test the adaptive value (benefits) of morphological and physiological plasticity responding to variation in light and nutrient availability. Important Findings Plants grown in shade exhibited lower values for fitness measures (fruit number, ramet number, and biomass), shortened thinner internode length, and decreased adult leaf chlorophyll content, but higher petiole length, specific leaf area, and old leaf chlorophyll content, than plants grown without shade. Plants grown in the low nutrient condition had shorter petiole length, thicker and smaller leaf area, lower chlorophyll content, but higher fruit number and root: shoot ratio than plants grown under the high nutrient condition. Selection gradient analyses revealed that plasticity of petiole length and old leaf chlorophyll content in response to light variation was adaptive, and plasticity of old and adult leaf chlorophyll content in response to nutrient variation was adaptive. Therefore, the adaptive value of plasticity in different traits depends on the specific ecological context. Our findings contribute to understanding the adaptive significance of phenotypic plasticity of clonal plants in response to environmental variation.

Clonal Transgenerational Effects of Parental Grazing Environment on Offspring Shade Avoidance

“…In detail, the results in this study showed that shade triggers morphological shade avoidance syndrome (SAS) both in NG and OG offspring, with higher plant vegetative height, leaf length, leaf width, and lower ramet number, stem diameter, and leaf inclination angle (Figure 2), which can be interpreted as active plastic responses [24,70]. To cope with spatial and temporal variations in light, plants often display a broad spectrum of phenotypic plasticity [71].…”

“…Earlier studies have also indicated that plants tend to produce larger leaves and longer internodes to intercept light efficiently [72,73]. Shade with a reduction in the R/FR ratio negatively affected vegetative ramet number [70]. Reallocation of energy resources from storage organs (e.g., root) to stem and leaf enabled the shaded plants to outgrow their competitors and enhance light capture [74].…”

Warming in combination with increased precipitation mediate the sexual and clonal reproduction in the desert steppe dominant species Stipa breviflora

“…Clonal plants can successfully adapt to new environments, allowing them to dominate many ecosystems [ 27 , 52 ] owing to traits such as clonal plasticity, which enables the production of different phenotypes in different environments [ 59 , 61 ], clonal integration, facilitating translocation and sharing of resources and/or signals between ramets connected by clonal organs [ 60 , 70 ]; clonal foraging, leading to the allocation of more roots, shoots, and/or whole ramets in high-resource patches [ 9 , 10 , 72 ], and trade-offs between different clonal growth forms [ 73 , 76 ]. Most clonal plants have the capacity for both sexual and clonal reproduction [ 22 , 27 , 28 , 41 ].…”