Nov 13 – 15, 2024
Leipziger KUBUS Helmholtz-Zentrum für Umweltforschung – UFZ
Europe/Berlin timezone
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Sources of Variation in Plant Chemical Diversity

Nov 15, 2024, 11:45 AM
15m
Leipziger KUBUS/1-B - Hall 1 B (Leipziger KUBUS)

Leipziger KUBUS/1-B - Hall 1 B

Leipziger KUBUS

150
Talk Molecular Biodiversity and Evolution Talk Session

Speaker

Linh Mai Nhat Nguyen

Description

Plants, like many other organisms, produce a tremendous variety of secondary compounds that are crucial to interspecific and intraspecific interactions, as well as to adaptation to environmental changes. This chemical diversity has been attributed to multiple factors such as function (e.g. defense, pollinator attraction), tissue-specific needs, various constraints, and phylogenetic history. Yet the interplay between these multiple factors driving plant chemodiversity is still unclear, primarily because the vast majority of studies focused on a single organ - (mostly leaves), or when comparing different organs, focused on single taxa. As such, the interplay between function and phylogenetic effects remains unclear. Using a novel model system of wild figs from Madagascar, this study tests (a) the degree to which phylogeny explains variation in fruit and leaf chemodiversity (b) to what degree phytochemical diversity is explained by tissue-specific function.
We applied an untargeted metabolomics approach to unripe fruits and leaves from eight species of wild figs (Ficus spp) sampled in a tropical rainforest in Madagascar. We characterized their chemical profiles using ultra-performance liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry and, using six genetic markers, reconstructed their phylogeny to understand the patterns of chemodiversity. We found a significant, but moderate phylogenetic effect in fruit chemodiversity, and no phylogenetic effect in leaf chemodiversity. Fruit and leaf metabolomes were more similar to the same tissue in other species than to the other tissue within the species. Our results indicate that, while phylogeny plays a role in plant chemodiversity, functional convergence of tissue-specific metabolites is a major driver of plant chemodiversity.

Status Group Doctoral Researcher

Primary author

Co-authors

Mrs Diary Razafimandimby (Faculty of Sciences, Zoology and Animal Biodiversity, University of Antananarivo, Antananarivo, Madagascar) Dr Jana Ebersbach (Department of Molecular Evolution and Plant Systematics and Herbarium (LZ), Institute of Biology, Leipzig University, Leipzig, Germany) Prof. Nicole van Dam (Leibniz Institute of Vegetable and Ornamental Crops (IGZ), Großbeeren, Germany) Dr Omer Nevo (German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle- Jena- Leipzig/ Uni- Jena, Germany) Prof. Philipp Schluter (Department of Plant Evolutionary Biology, Institute of Biology, University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart, Germany) Dr Rebekka Sontowski (Leibniz Institute of Vegetable and Ornamental Crops (IGZ), Großbeeren, Germany) Dr Renske Onstein (Naturalis Biodiversity Center, Leiden, Netherlands)

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