Clones on task serve greater good, evolutionary s...(s occur. One plant in the A family might...)

Date:8/13/2007

s occur. One plant in the A family might get a few more minutes of sunshine a day, another might get more water, but they pretty much grow up to be just like their parent. The identical offspring of Plant B grow up the same way, except more of the plants in the B family go crazy with those environmental changes. Some get taller than their parents, some are stunted by those little environmental hiccoughs.

The scientific intrigue comes when scientists call a big family reunion, and discover that the A family all look close to alike, despite those subtle environmental differences. Family B, however, clearly didnt follow the family genetic rules, with some towering over the group, and others being vertically challenged.

And like family reunions, the competition is decided as everyone compares pictures of the grandchildren. In Arabadopsiss case, the solid Family A produces more children or flowers, than the erratic Family B. As it turns out, and perhaps not surprisingly, those genotypes that tended in general to vary more, tended to not produce as many flowers (and thus were less likely to reproduce successfully), Dworkin said. There definitely are costs to variation. In addition, this study provides preliminary evidence that a well known plant development gene ERECTA may be in part responsible for some of the change in some genotypes. However, Dworkin said this conclusion requires further study.

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Contact: Ian Dworkin idworkin@msu.edu 517-432-6733 Michigan State University Source:Eurekalert

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