| Abstrakt: |
Secondary metabolites are biochemicals produced by plants in response to selection pressures. These pressures may be from herbivory, competition, or the need for pollination. As plants produce compounds to enhance their survival, predators, competitors, and pollinators react and evolve means of adjusting to the plant’s efforts. Chemically simple secondary metabolites may be widespread throughout angiosperm (flowering plant) families, whereas more complex chemicals are often restricted to a single species. Secondary metabolites are often under high selection pressures, causing individual compounds to have very limited distributions and making them useful in determining the evolutionary relationships between taxonomic groups. Presence of secondary compounds influences the activities of organisms interacting with the plants and, over long periods of time, influences evolution of those species. |
