Crop Domestication Alters Floral Reward Chemistry With Potential Consequences for Pollinator Health.

ABSTRACT: Crop domestication can lead to weakened expression of plant defences, with repercussions for herbivore and pathogen susceptibility. However, little is known about how domestication alters traits that mediate other important ecological interactions in crops, such as pollination. Secondary metabolites, which underpin many defence responses in plants, also occur widely in nectar and pollen and influence plant-pollinator interactions. Thus, domestication may also affect secondary compounds in floral rewards, with potential consequences for pollinators. To test this hypothesis, we chemically analysed nectar and pollen from wild and cultivated plants of highbush blueberry (Vaccinium corymbosum L.), before conducting an artificial diet bioassay to examine pollinator-pathogen interactions.

SUBMITTER: Egan PA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6169423 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature