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Maternal effects on seed heteromorphism: a dual dynamic bet hedging strategy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 July 2019

Li Jiang ,
Lei Wang Open the ORCID record for Lei Wang [Opens in a new window] ,
Carol C. Baskin ,
Changyan Tian  and
Zhenying Huang
Li Jiang
Affiliation:
State Key Laboratory of Desert and Oasis Ecology, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi, China Key Laboratory of Biogeography and Bioresource in Arid Land, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi, China
Lei Wang*
Affiliation:
State Key Laboratory of Desert and Oasis Ecology, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi, China
Carol C. Baskin
Affiliation:
Department of Biology, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506, USA Department of Plant and Soil Sciences, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40546, USA
Changyan Tian
Affiliation:
State Key Laboratory of Desert and Oasis Ecology, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi, China
Zhenying Huang*
Affiliation:
State Key Laboratory of Vegetation and Environmental Change, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
*
Author for correspondence: Lei Wang, Email: [email protected] and Zhenying Huang, Email: [email protected]
Author for correspondence: Lei Wang, Email: [email protected] and Zhenying Huang, Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

Maternal effects on offspring seeds are mainly caused by seed position on, and the abiotic environment of, the mother plant. Seed heteromorphism, a special form of position effect, is the production by an individual plant of morphologically distinct seed types, usually with different ecological behaviours. Seed heteromorphism is assumed to be a form of bet hedging and provides an ideal biological model to test theoretical predictions. Most studies of maternal effects on seeds have focused on abiotic environmental factors and changes in mean seed traits of offspring. Suaeda salsa is an annual halophyte that produces dimorphic seeds within the same inflorescence. We tested the hypothesis that plants grown from brown seeds of S. salsa have a higher offspring brown seed:black seed morph ratio and variance in seed size than plants from black seeds. Results from a pot experiment showed that plants grown from brown seeds had a higher brown seed:black seed ratio than plants grown from black seeds. This is the first layer of dynamic bet hedging. Brown seeds had higher size variation than black seeds, and seeds produced by plants from brown seeds also had higher seed size variation than plants grown from black seeds. This is the second layer of dynamic bet hedging. Thus, the maternal effect of seed heteromorphism is dual dynamic bet hedging. Furthermore, for seed traits we verified for the first time the theoretical prediction that an increase in offspring size variability induces an increase in the mean size of offspring.

Keywords

bet hedgingmaternal effectseed heteromorphismseed sizeSuaeda
Type
Short Communication
Information
Seed Science Research , Volume 29 , Issue 2 , June 2019 , pp. 149 - 153
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2019 

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