Genetically based differentiation in growth of multiple non-native plant species along a steep environmental gradient

Research output: Journal contributionsJournal articlesResearchpeer-review

Authors

A non-native plant species spreading along an environmental gradient may need to adjust its growth to the prevailing conditions that it encounters by a combination of phenotypic plasticity and genetic adaptation. There have been several studies of how non-native species respond to changing environmental conditions along latitudinal gradients, but much less is known about elevational gradients. We conducted a climate chamber experiment to investigate plastic and genetically based growth responses of 13 herbaceous non-native plants along an elevational gradient from 100 to 2,000 m a. s. l. in Tenerife. Conditions in the field ranged from high anthropogenic disturbance but generally favourable temperatures for plant growth in the lower half of the gradient, to low disturbance but much cooler conditions in the upper half. We collected seed from low, mid and high elevations and grew them in climate chambers under the characteristic temperatures at these three elevations. Growth of all species was reduced under lower temperatures along both halves of the gradient. We found consistent genetically based differences in growth over the upper elevational gradient, with plants from high-elevation sites growing more slowly than those from mid-elevation ones, while the pattern in the lower part of the gradient was more mixed. Our data suggest that many non-native plants might respond to climate along elevational gradients by genetically based changes in key traits, especially at higher elevations where low temperatures probably impose a stronger selection pressure. At lower elevations, where anthropogenic influences are greater, higher gene flow and frequent disturbance might favour genotypes with broad ecological amplitudes. Thus the importance of evolutionary processes for invasion success is likely to be context-dependent.

Original languageEnglish
JournalOecologia
Volume170
Issue number1
Pages (from-to)89-99
Number of pages11
ISSN0029-8549
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 01.09.2012
Externally publishedYes

    Research areas

  • Biology - alien, elevational gradient, phenotypic plasticity, plant invasions, Rapid evolution

Recently viewed

Publications

  1. Mechanics of sheet-bulk indentation
  2. Heterogenität
  3. Benchmarking question answering systems
  4. Are the terms “Socio-economic status” and “Class status” a warped form of reasoning for Max Weber?
  5. Recruitment practices in small and medium size enterprises.
  6. Ownership Patterns and Enterprise Groups in German Structural Business Statistics
  7. Tree diversity promotes predator but not omnivore ants in a subtropical Chinese forest
  8. Robust Control using Sliding Mode Approach for Ice-Clamping Device activated by Thermoelectric Coolers
  9. Facing Up to Third Party Liability for Space Activities
  10. A practical perspective on repatriate knowledge transfer
  11. Implementierung eines Fehlerpräventionsprogramms für gefahrenintensive Arbeitsprozesse
  12. Semi-polar root exudates in natural grassland communities
  13. »CO2 causes a hole in the atmosphere« Using laypeople’s conceptions as a starting point to communicate climate change
  14. ETL ensembles for chunking, NER and SRL
  15. Time and Income Poverty – An Interdependent Multidimensional Poverty Approach with German Time Use Diary Data
  16. Criticality and Values in Digital Transformation Research: Insights from a Workshop
  17. Commitment Strategies for Sustainability
  18. The Weinberg-Salam Model of Electroweak Interactions
  19. Fostering pre-service teachers’ knowledge of ‘teaching games for understanding’ via video-based vs. text-based teaching examples
  20. Plants, Androids and Operators
  21. Visualizing stakeholders’ willingness for collective action in participatory scenario planning
  22. Action theory
  23. Time Use and Time Budgets
  24. Direct measurement of cognitive load in multimedia learning
  25. No need for new natural gas pipelines and LNG terminalsin Europe
  26. Das Problem der Unbestimmtheit des Rechts
  27. Effect of salinity-changing rates on filtration activity of mussels from two sites within the Baltic Mytilus hybrid zone
  28. Politics after Networks
  29. Leaf Nutritional Content, Tree Richness, and Season Shape the Caterpillar Functional Trait Composition Hosted by Trees
  30. Step back from the forest and step up to the Bonn Challenge
  31. Intermediate `time-spaces' - The rediscovery of transition in spatial planning and environmental planning
  32. The role of human resource practices for including persons with disabilities in the workforce
  33. Genetically based differentiation in growth of multiple non-native plant species along a steep environmental gradient
  34. Watch out, pothole! Featuring Road Damage Detection in an End-to-end System for Autonomous Driving
  35. Negotiation complexity
  36. Exploring the motivations of protesters in contingent valuation
  37. Modelling and simulation of dynamic microstructure evolution of aluminium alloys during thermomechanically coupled extrusion process
  38. Automated text analyses of sustainability & integrated reporting.
  39. Learning to collaborate while collaborating
  40. External rotation of the auditor
  41. Local levers for change
  42. Three schools of transformation thinking
  43. Depoliticising EU migration policies
  44. Combined experimental–numerical study on residual stresses induced by a single impact as elementary process of mechanical peening
  45. Philosophie in Metropolen?
  46. Søren Kierkegaard in deutscher Sprache
  47. Thermodynamic description of reactions between Mg and CaO
  48. Conceptual frameworks and methods for advancing invasion ecology