Drought Sensitivity of Norway Spruce at the Species' Warmest Fringe: Quantitative and Molecular Analysis Reveals High Genetic Variation Among and Within Provenances.

ABSTRACT: Norway spruce (Picea abies) is by far the most important timber species in Europe, but its outstanding role in future forests is jeopardized by its high sensitivity to drought. We analyzed drought response of Norway spruce at the warmest fringe of its natural range. Based on a 35-year old provenance experiment we tested for genetic variation among and within seed provenances across consecutively occurring strong drought events using dendroclimatic time series. Moreover, we tested for associations between ≈1,700 variable SNPs and traits related to drought response, wood characteristics and climate-growth relationships. We found significant adaptive genetic variation among provenances originating from the species' Alpine, Central and Southeastern European range. Genetic variation betw

SUBMITTER: Trujillo-Moya C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5873913 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature