Comparative studies of evolutionary responses to light environments in Arabidopsis
Related Experiment Video
Updated: Sep 26, 2026

Analysis of Arabidopsis thaliana Growth Behavior in Different Light Qualities
Published on: February 2, 2018
Massimo Pigliucci1, Heidi Pollard, Mitchell B Cruzan
1Department of Botany, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tennessee 37996-1100, USA. pigliucci@utk.edu
Abstract:
In this article, we compare the reaction norms to foliage shade (changes in light quality, spatially fine-grained environmental variation) and photoperiod (day length, spatially coarse-grained environmental variation) in several haplotypes of Arabidopsis thaliana from Scandinavia. We found that both across-environment means and phenotypic plasticities evolved continuously and very rapidly within this group. Both character means and trait plasticities were highly integrated, in part as predicted by the adaptive plasticity hypothesis for response to foliage shade (the so-called shade-avoidance syndrome). We found that a significant but small fraction of the variance in across-treatment trait means and plasticities in response to one environmental factor is explained by variation of the same traits in response to the other factor. Genetic relatedness based on chloroplast DNA sequence variation among haplotypes was not associated with variation in across-treatment character means or their plasticities, suggesting that evolution of these characters has occurred on a local geographic scale via reticulation (outcrossing) among maternal lines rather than by the differential survival of selfing lineages.
More Related Videos
10:10Investigating Tissue- and Organ-specific Phytochrome Responses using FACS-assisted Cell-type Specific Expression Profiling in Arabidopsis thaliana
Published on: May 29, 2010
07:45Using Changes in Leaf Transmission to Investigate Chloroplast Movement in Arabidopsis thaliana
Published on: July 14, 2021
Related Concept Videos
Photoreceptors and Plant Responses to Light
Biological Clocks and Seasonal Responses
Cell Signaling in Plants
The Antenna Complex
Light Acquisition
Epiphytes, Parasites, and Carnivores