Genetic variation and clonal diversity in floating aquatic plants: Comparative genomic analysis of water hyacinth species in their native range

Abstract

Many eukaryotic organisms, including fungi, protozoa, invertebrates, algae and land plants, have mixed reproductive strategies multiplying by sexual and asexual reproduction. The commonest form of asexual reproduction in angiosperms is vegetative propagation, also referred to as simply clonal growth (Harper, 1977). Approximately 80% of flowering plants have some form of clonal propagation (Klimes et al., 1997) in which vegetative shoots (ramets) are produced by the parental genotype (genet) during growth. Clonality is associated with perennial life histories, longevity of genets, and habitats in which sexual recruitment is often restricted by environmental conditions (Eckert et al., 2016;Vallejo-Marín et al., 2010). Intrinsic features of life history interacting with the environments in which

Genomic analysis of the emergent aquatic plant Sparganium stoloniferum provides insights into its clonality, local adaptation and demographic history

“…However, the distance and frequency of their dispersal in aquatic plants are poorly understood (Li, 2014). A genomic study of Eichhornia crassipes in its native range revealed long-distance and interbasin dispersals of vegetative propagules (up to 1500 km) (Cunha et al, 2022), which confirmed the hypothesis of high clonal dispersibility in free-floating aquatic plants (Sculthorpe, 1967). However, our study suggests that long-distance and interbasin dispersals of vegetative propagules (up to 1041 km) also occur in emergent aquatic plants.…”

“…Among four basic aquatic life forms, free-floating and floating-leaved aquatic plants were supposed to have higher dispersibility of vegetative propagules (Sculthorpe, 1967). A recent study using genomic data verified the effective long-distance and interbasin dispersal of vegetative propagules in floating leaved Eichhornia azurea (up to 185 km) and free-floating E. crassipes (up to 1500 km) in central South America, the native range of both species (Cunha et al, 2022). However, genomic analyses at large scales are lacking in emergent and submerged aquatic plants, which are essential to measuring the magnitude of vegetative propagule dispersal in emergent and submerged species.…”

“…For native species, multiple populations from heterogeneous habitats often exhibit different levels of clonal propagation (Dorken & Eckert, 2001; Pollux et al, 2007). However, except for several recent studies using genomic data (Cunha et al, 2022; Edgeloe et al, 2022; Yu et al, 2020), the molecular markers used in the vast majority of previous studies were randomly amplified polymorphic DNAs (RAPDs), amplified fragment length polymorphisms (AFLPs), intersimple sequence repeats (ISSRs) or microsatellites (SSR). These are far from genome‐level markers and are likely to overestimate the level of clonality.…”

Environment influences the genetic structure and genetic differentiation of Sassafras tzumu (Lauraceae)

“…Sequence data obtained from the Hiseq X Ten platform were processed for SNPs identification using the GBS pipeline integrated within Stacks 3.0.166 [ 56 ]. In brief, variants were filtered using Vcftools 0.1.14 [ 57 ] based on criteria such as a minimum depth of coverage (> 5), quality score (> 30), and an initial maximum missingness of 50% [ 58 ]. Subsequently, the dataset was examined to ensure that no samples exhibited high levels of missingness (all samples were found to have less than 30% missing data).…”

Genomic evidence of long-term asexuality at the northern range limit of the wetland plant, Decodon verticillatus (Lythraceae)

“…Hence the pattern of isolation by distance widely expected among sexual populations should be much weaker among asexual populations. This prediction has rarely been tested, with mixed results (da Cunha et al 2022;Guillemeinet al 2008).…”