A unified approach to the estimation and interpretation of resistance costs in plants.

ABSTRACT: Plants exhibit a number of adaptive defence traits that endow resistance to past and current abiotic and biotic stresses. It is generally accepted that these adaptations will incur a cost when plants are not challenged by the stress to which they have become adapted--the so-called 'cost of adaptation'. The need to minimise or account for allelic variation at other fitness-related loci (genetic background control) is frequently overlooked when assessing resistance costs associated with plant defence traits. We provide a synthesis of the various experimental protocols that accomplish this essential requirement. We also differentiate those methods that enable the identification of the trait-specific or mechanistic basis of costs (direct methods) from those that provide an estimate of the impa

SUBMITTER: Vila-Aiub MM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3199924 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature