Reduced plant competition among kin can be explained by Jensen's inequality.

ABSTRACT: Plants often compete with closely related individuals due to limited dispersal, leading to two commonly invoked predictions on competitive outcomes. Kin selection, from evolutionary theory, predicts that competition between relatives will likely be weaker. The niche partitioning hypothesis, from ecological theory, predicts that competition between close relatives will likely be stronger. We tested for evidence consistent with either of these predictions by growing an annual legume in kin and nonkin groups in the greenhouse. We grew plant groups in treatments of symbiotic nitrogen fixing bacteria differing in strain identity and composition to determine if differences in the microbial environment can facilitate or obscure plant competition patterns consistent with kin selection or niche par

SUBMITTER: Simonsen AK 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4264895 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature