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Seeds and seasons: interpreting germination timing in the field

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 February 2007

Kathleen Donohue
Kathleen Donohue*
Affiliation:
Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, 22 Divinity Ave., Cambridge, MA 02138, USA
*
*Correspondence Fax: +1 617 495 9484, Email: kdonohue@oeb.harvard.edu
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Abstract

This paper discusses how field and laboratory experiments, using a variety of genetic material, can be combined to investigate the genetic basis of germination under realistic ecological conditions, and it reviews some of our recent work on germination phenology of Arabidopsis thaliana in the field. Our results indicate that the genetic basis of germination depends on the environment. In particular, the conditions during seed maturation interact with post-dispersal environmental factors to determine germination phenology, and these interactions have a genetic basis. Therefore genetic studies of germination need to consider carefully the environment – both during seed maturation and after dispersal – in which the experiments are conducted in order to characterize genetic pathways involved with germination in the field. Laboratory studies that explicitly manipulate ecologically relevant environmental factors can be combined with manipulative field studies. These studies can identify the particular environmental cues to which seeds respond in the field and characterize the genetic basis of germination responses to those cues. In addition, a variety of genetic material – including mutant and transgenic lines, intact natural genotypes, recombinant genotypes, and near isogenic lines – can be used in field studies as tools to characterize genetic pathways involved in germination schedules under natural ecological conditions.

Keywords

Arabidopsis thalianadormancylife historymaternal effectsphenotypic plasticityphotoperiodseasonal cuesstratification
Type
Invited Review and Research Opinion
Information
Seed Science Research , Volume 15 , Issue 3 , September 2005 , pp. 175 - 187
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2005

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