1
|
Sun X, Sun Y, Cao X, Zhai X, Callaway RM, Wan J, Flory SL, Huang W, Ding J. Trade-offs in non-native plant herbivore defences enhance performance. Ecol Lett 2023; 26:1584-1596. [PMID: 37387416 DOI: 10.1111/ele.14283] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/02/2023] [Revised: 05/25/2023] [Accepted: 05/29/2023] [Indexed: 07/01/2023]
Abstract
Non-native plants are typically released from specialist enemies but continue to be attacked by generalists, albeit at lower intensities. This reduced herbivory may lead to less investment in constitutive defences and greater investment in induced defences, potentially reducing defence costs. We compared herbivory on 27 non-native and 59 native species in the field and conducted bioassays and chemical analyses on 12 pairs of non-native and native congeners. Non-natives suffered less damage and had weaker constitutive defences, but stronger induced defences than natives. For non-natives, the strength of constitutive defences was correlated with the intensity of herbivory experienced, whereas induced defences showed the reverse. Investment in induced defences correlated positively with growth, suggesting a novel mechanism for the evolution of increased competitive ability. To our knowledge, these are the first linkages reported among trade-offs in plant defences related to the intensity of herbivory, allocation to constitutive versus induced defences, and growth.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Xiao Sun
- State Key Laboratory of Crop Stress Adaptation and Improvement, School of Life Sciences, Henan University, Kaifeng, China
| | - Yumei Sun
- State Key Laboratory of Crop Stress Adaptation and Improvement, School of Life Sciences, Henan University, Kaifeng, China
| | - Xueyao Cao
- State Key Laboratory of Crop Stress Adaptation and Improvement, School of Life Sciences, Henan University, Kaifeng, China
| | - Xincong Zhai
- State Key Laboratory of Crop Stress Adaptation and Improvement, School of Life Sciences, Henan University, Kaifeng, China
| | - Ragan M Callaway
- Division of Biological Sciences, University of Montana, Missoula, Montana, USA
| | - Jinlong Wan
- Key Laboratory of Aquatic Botany and Watershed Ecology, Wuhan Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, China
| | - S Luke Flory
- Agronomy Department, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, USA
| | - Wei Huang
- Key Laboratory of Aquatic Botany and Watershed Ecology, Wuhan Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, China
| | - Jianqing Ding
- State Key Laboratory of Crop Stress Adaptation and Improvement, School of Life Sciences, Henan University, Kaifeng, China
| |
Collapse
|
2
|
Kessler A, Mueller MB, Kalske A, Chautá A. Volatile-mediated plant-plant communication and higher-level ecological dynamics. Curr Biol 2023; 33:R519-R529. [PMID: 37279686 DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2023.04.025] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 12.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/08/2023]
Abstract
Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in general and herbivory-induced plant volatiles (HIPVs) in particular are increasingly understood as major mediators of information transfer between plant tissues. Recent findings have moved the field of plant communication closer to a detailed understanding of how plants emit and perceive VOCs and seem to converge on a model that juxtaposes perception and emission mechanisms. These new mechanistic insights help to explain how plants can integrate different types of information and how environmental noise can affect the transmission of information. At the same time, ever-new functions of VOC-mediated plant-plant interactions are being revealed. Chemical information transfer between plants is now known to fundamentally affect plant organismal interactions and, additionally, population, community, and ecosystem dynamics. One of the most exciting new developments places plant-plant interactions along a behavioral continuum with an eavesdropping strategy at one end and mutually beneficial information-sharing among plants within a population at the other. Most importantly and based on recent findings as well as theoretical models, plant populations can be predicted to evolve different communication strategies depending on their interaction environment. We use recent studies from ecological model systems to illustrate this context dependency of plant communication. Moreover, we review recent key findings about the mechanisms and functions of HIPV-mediated information transfer and suggest conceptual links, such as to information theory and behavioral game theory, as valuable tools for a deeper understanding of how plant-plant communication affects ecological and evolutionary dynamics.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- André Kessler
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
| | - Michael B Mueller
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA; Department of Entomology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA
| | - Aino Kalske
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA; Department of Biology, University of Turku, 20014 Turku, Finland
| | - Alexander Chautá
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA
| |
Collapse
|
3
|
Kalske A, Kessler A. Herbivory selects for tolerance and constitutive defence across stages of community succession. Proc Biol Sci 2023; 290:20222458. [PMID: 36787795 PMCID: PMC9928524 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2022.2458] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/08/2022] [Accepted: 01/13/2023] [Indexed: 02/16/2023] Open
Abstract
Plants defend themselves from herbivory by either reducing damage (resistance) or minimizing its negative fitness effects with compensatory growth (tolerance). Herbivore pressure can fluctuate from year to year in an early secondary successional community, which can create temporal variation in selection for defence traits. We manipulated insect herbivory and successional age of the community as agents of natural selection in replicated common gardens with the perennial herb Solidago altissima. In these genotypic selection experiments, herbivory consistently selected for better defended plants in both successional communities. Herbivore suppression increased plant survival and the probability of flowering only in mid-succession. Despite these substantial differences in the effects of herbivory between early and mid-succession, the selection on defence traits did not change. Succession affected selection only on aboveground biomass, with positive selection in early but not mid-succession, suggesting an important role of competition in the selective environment. These results demonstrate that changes in the community that affect key life-history traits in an individual species can occur over very short timescales in a dynamic secondary successional environment. The resulting community context-driven variation in natural selection may be an important, yet overlooked, contributor to adaptive mosaics across populations.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Aino Kalske
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA
| | - André Kessler
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA
| |
Collapse
|
4
|
Coverdale TC, Agrawal AA. Experimental insect suppression causes loss of induced, but not constitutive, resistance in Solanum carolinense. Ecology 2022; 103:e3786. [PMID: 35711089 DOI: 10.1002/ecy.3786] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/01/2022] [Revised: 04/29/2022] [Accepted: 05/16/2022] [Indexed: 11/06/2022]
Abstract
Spatiotemporal variation in herbivory is a major driver of intraspecific variation in plant defense. Comparatively little is known, however, about how changes in herbivory regime affect the balance of constitutive and induced resistance, which are often considered alternative defensive strategies. Here, we investigated how nearly a decade of insect herbivore suppression affected constitutive and induced resistance in horsenettle (Solanum carolinense), a widespread herbaceous perennial. We allowed replicated horsenettle populations to respond to the presence or absence of herbivores by applying insecticide to all plants in half of 16 field plots. Horsenettle density rapidly increased in response to insecticide treatment, and this effect persisted for at least four years after the cessation of herbivore suppression. We subsequently grew half-sibling families from seeds collected during and shortly after insecticide treatment in a common garden and found strong effects of insect suppression on induced resistance. Feeding trials in field mesocosms with false Colorado potato beetles (Leptinotarsa juncta), a common specialist herbivore, revealed that multi-year herbivore suppression drove rapid attenuation of induced resistance: offspring of plants from insect-suppression plots exhibited a near-complete loss of induced resistance to beetles, while those from control plots incurred ~70% less damage after experimental induction. Plants from insect-suppression plots also had ~40% greater constitutive resistance than those from control plots, although this difference was not statistically significant. We nonetheless detected a strong trade-off between constitutive and induced resistance across families. In contrast, the constitutive expression of trypsin inhibitors (TI), an important chemical defense trait in horsenettle, was reduced by 20% in the offspring of plants from insect-suppression plots relative to those from control plots. However, TIs were induced to an equal extent whether or not insect herbivores had been historically suppressed. While several defense and performance traits (prickle density, TI concentration, resistance against false Colorado potato beetles and flea beetles, biomass, and seed mass) varied markedly across families, no traits exhibited significant pairwise correlations. Overall, our results indicate that, while the divergent responses of multiple defense traits to insect suppression led to comparatively small changes in overall constitutive resistance, they significantly reduced induced resistance against false Colorado potato beetle.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Tyler C Coverdale
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA.,Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Anurag A Agrawal
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA.,Department of Entomology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA
| |
Collapse
|
5
|
Yang N, Jiang W, Jiang B, Liu J, Liu Y, Wang H, Guo X, Tang Z. Cotyledon loss of Astragalus membranaceus hindered seedling establishment through mineral element reallocation and carbohydrate depletion. PLANT PHYSIOLOGY AND BIOCHEMISTRY : PPB 2021; 167:481-491. [PMID: 34425393 DOI: 10.1016/j.plaphy.2021.08.027] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/14/2021] [Revised: 08/11/2021] [Accepted: 08/15/2021] [Indexed: 06/13/2023]
Abstract
Tissue loss of plants caused by herbivores is very common in nature. As the storage and first photosynthetic organ, the loss of cotyledon severely impacts dicot seedling establishment and the subsequent growth. However, it is still not clear how plants adjust their metabolic strategy in response to cotyledon loss. In this study, we employed ICP-OES, GC and LC-MS to examine the effects of cotyledon removal (RC1: remove one cotyledon, RC2: remove two cotyledon) on mineral element distribution and metabolite changes in a traditional Chinese herbal plant, Astragalus membranaceus. The results showed that cotyledon removal had a greater effect on shoot than root growth. Specifically, RC2 revealed a more serious impact on shoot growth than RC1. Microelement Mn and Na in shoot increased more in RC2 than RC1. Macroelement K and microelement B in root increased in RC2. The metabolite results in shoot showed that sugars related to galactose metabolism reduced while amino acids significantly increased in RC2. In root, sugars related to fructose and mannose metabolism decreased in both RC1 and RC2 while most flavonoids increased in RC2. It can be concluded that cotyledon removal triggered different metabolic strategies in both root and shoot. In shoot, more Mn was absorbed to improve the lowered photosynthetic efficiency. Meanwhile, increased Na may have promoted carbohydrate consumption and amino acid synthesis, thereby maintaining shoot growth. In root, K and B participation in cell division and expansion increased, as well as the delivery and metabolism of carbohydrates, to maintain root system growth.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Nan Yang
- College of Chemistry, Chemical Engineering and Resource Utilization, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, 150040, China; Key Laboratory of Forest Plant Ecology, Ministry of Education, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, 150040, China
| | - Wanting Jiang
- College of Chemistry, Chemical Engineering and Resource Utilization, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, 150040, China; Key Laboratory of Forest Plant Ecology, Ministry of Education, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, 150040, China
| | - Bing Jiang
- Harbin Customs Technology Center, Harbin, 150040, China
| | - Jia Liu
- Key Laboratory of Soybean Molecular Design Breeding, Northeast Institute of Geography and Agroecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Harbin, 150081, China
| | - Yang Liu
- School of Life Sciences, Heilongjiang University, Harbin, 150080, China
| | - Hongzheng Wang
- College of Chemistry, Chemical Engineering and Resource Utilization, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, 150040, China; Key Laboratory of Forest Plant Ecology, Ministry of Education, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, 150040, China.
| | - Xiaorui Guo
- College of Chemistry, Chemical Engineering and Resource Utilization, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, 150040, China; Key Laboratory of Forest Plant Ecology, Ministry of Education, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, 150040, China.
| | - Zhonghua Tang
- College of Chemistry, Chemical Engineering and Resource Utilization, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, 150040, China; Key Laboratory of Forest Plant Ecology, Ministry of Education, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, 150040, China
| |
Collapse
|
6
|
Agrawal AA, Hastings AP, Maron JL. Evolution and seed dormancy shape plant genotypic structure through a successional cycle. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2021; 118:e2026212118. [PMID: 34400497 PMCID: PMC8403902 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2026212118] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
Dormancy has repeatedly evolved in plants, animals, and microbes and is hypothesized to facilitate persistence in the face of environmental change. Yet previous experiments have not tracked demography and trait evolution spanning a full successional cycle to ask whether early bouts of natural selection are later reinforced or erased during periods of population dormancy. In addition, it is unclear how well short-term measures of fitness predict long-term genotypic success for species with dormancy. Here, we address these issues using experimental field populations of the plant Oenothera biennis, which evolved over five generations in plots exposed to or protected from insect herbivory. While populations existed above ground, there was rapid evolution of defensive and life-history traits, but populations lost genetic diversity and crashed as succession proceeded. After >5 y of seed dormancy, we triggered germination from the seedbank and genotyped >3,000 colonizers. Resurrected populations showed restored genetic diversity that reduced earlier responses to selection and pushed population phenotypes toward the starting conditions of a decade earlier. Nonetheless, four defense and life-history traits remained differentiated in populations with insect suppression compared with controls. These findings capture key missing elements of evolution during ecological cycles and demonstrate the impact of dormancy on future evolutionary responses to environmental change.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Anurag A Agrawal
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853;
| | - Amy P Hastings
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853
| | - John L Maron
- Division of Biological Sciences, University of Montana, Missoula, MT 59803
| |
Collapse
|