Induced responses contribute to rapid adaptation of Spirodela polyrhiza to herbivory by Lymnaea stagnalis.

ABSTRACT: Herbivory-induced responses in plants are typical examples of phenotypic plasticity, and their evolution is thought to be driven by herbivory. However, direct evidence of the role of induced responses in plant adaptive evolution to herbivores is scarce. Here, we experimentally evolve populations of an aquatic plant (Spirodela polyrhiza, giant duckweed) and its native herbivore (Lymnaea stagnalis, freshwater snail), testing whether herbivory drives rapid adaptive evolution in plant populations using a combination of bioassays, pool-sequencing, metabolite analyses, and amplicon metagenomics. We show that snail herbivory drove rapid phenotypic changes, increased herbivory resistance, and altered genotype frequencies in the plant populations. Additional bioassays suggest that evolutionary chan

SUBMITTER: Malacrino A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10781955 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature