Differential phenotypic and genetic expression of defence compounds in a plant–herbivore interaction along elevation

Autor: Anne-Lyse Ducrest, Tomasz Suchan, Nadir Alvarez, Sergio Rasmann, Loïc Pellissier, Ana L. Salgado
Přispěvatelé: Biosciences, Centre of Excellence in Metapopulation Research, Life-history Evolution Research Group
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2016
Předmět:
0301 basic medicine
cyanogenic glycosides
Defence mechanisms
GRADIENTS
Adult
Age Factors
Aged
Basilar Artery
Brain Stem
Cerebrovascular Disorders/complications
Cerebrovascular Disorders/diagnosis
Cerebrovascular Disorders/etiology
Cerebrovascular Disorders/mortality
Female
Germany
West

Hemiplegia/etiology
Humans
Hypertension/complications
Male
Middle Aged
Retrospective Studies
Unconsciousness/etiology
Biology
03 medical and health sciences
Lotaustralin
chemistry.chemical_compound
GLYCOSYLTRANSFERASE
Genetic variation
Lotus corniculatus
BIOSYNTHESIS
elevation gradient
GLUCOSIDES
ZYGAENA-FILIPENDULAE LEPIDOPTERA
ADAPTATION
lcsh:Science
TEMPERATURE
INSECT INTERACTIONS
Abiotic component
Herbivore
Multidisciplinary
Natural selection
Ecology
fungi
Biology (Whole Organism)
zygaena filipendulae
15. Life on land
ARABIDOPSIS
biology.organism_classification
030104 developmental biology
chemistry
1181 Ecology
evolutionary biology

gene expression
lotus corniculatus
1182 Biochemistry
cell and molecular biology

lcsh:Q
predation
Adaptation
Research Article
Zdroj: Royal Society Open Science, Vol 3, Iss 9 (2016)
Royal Society Open Science, vol. 3, no. 9, pp. 160226
Royal Society Open Science
ISSN: 2054-5703
DOI: 10.1098/rsos.160226
Popis: Elevation gradients impose large differences in abiotic and biotic conditions over short distances, in turn, likely driving differences in gene expression more than would genetic variation per se , as natural selection and drift are less likely to fix alleles at such a narrow spatial scale. As elevation increases, the pressure exerted on plants by herbivores and on arthropod herbivores by predators decreases, and organisms spanning the elevation gradient are thus expected to show lower levels of defence at high elevation. The alternative hypothesis, based on the optimal defence theory, is that defence allocation should be higher in low-resource habitats such as those at high elevation, due to higher costs associated with tissue replacement. In this study, we analyse variation with elevation in (i) defence compound content in the plant Lotus corniculatus and (ii) gene expression associated with defence against predators in the specific phytophagous moth, Zygaena filipendulae . Both species produce cyanogenic glycosides (CNglcs) such as lotaustralin and linamarin as defence mechanisms, with the moth, in addition, being able to sequester CNglcs from its host plant. Specifically, we tested the assumption that the defence-associated phenotype in plants and the gene expression in the insect herbivore should covary between low- and high-elevation environments. We found that L. corniculatus accumulated more CNglcs at high elevation, a result in agreement with the optimal defence theory. By contrast, we found that the levels of expression in the defence genes of Z. filipendulae larvae were not related to the CNglc content of their host plant. Overall, expression levels were not correlated with elevation either, with the exception of the UGT33A1 gene, which showed a marginally significant trend towards higher expression at high elevation when using a simple statistical framework. These results suggest that the defence phenotype of plants against herbivores, and subsequent herbivore sequestration machineries and de novo production, are based on a complex network of interactions.
Databáze: OpenAIRE