Both ecological and evolutionary processes can influence community assembly and stability, and native community members may respond both ecologically and evolutionarily as additional species enter established communities. Biological invasions provide a unique opportunity to examine these responses of native community members to novel species additions. Here, I use reciprocal transplant experime...

Genome-scale data offer the opportunity to clarify phylogenetic relationships that are difficult to resolve with few loci, but they can also identify genomic regions with evolutionary history distinct from that of the species history. We collected whole-genome sequence data from 29 taxa in the legume genus Medicago, then aligned these sequences to the Medicago truncatula reference genome to con...

Rhizobia secrete nodulation (Nod) factors, which set in motion the formation of nitrogen-fixing root nodules on legume host plants. Nod factors induce several cellular responses in root hair cells within minutes, but also are essential for the formation of infection threads by which rhizobia enter the root. Based on studies using bacterial mutants, a two-receptor model was proposed, a signaling...

A previous polymerase chain reaction based survey for the occurrence of the intron in chloroplast gene rpoC1 revealed its absence in one of the eight species of Medicago (Fabaceae; Trifolieae) examined. We extend the survey of Medicago to include 65 of the 86 species, representing all 12 sections and seven of the eight subsections recognized in the most recent comprehensive treatment of the gen...

Phosphorus (P)-deficiency is a major abiotic stress that limits legume growth in many types of soils. The relationship between Medicago and Sinorhizobium, is known to be affected by different environmental conditions. Recent reports have shown that, in combination with S. meliloti 2011, Medicago truncatula had a lower symbiotic efficiency than Medicago sativa. However, little is known about how...

Multilocus sequence typing (MLST) is a sequence-based method used to characterize bacterial genomes. This method was used to examine the genetic structure of Medicago-nodulating rhizobia at the Amra site, which is located in an arid region of Tunisia. Here the annual medics Medicago laciniata and M. truncatula are part of the natural flora. The goal of this study was to identify whether distinc...

BURP domain-containing proteins belong to a newly identified protein class that is unique to plants and plays an important role in plant development and metabolism. Although systematic characterization of BURP domain-containing proteins have been carried out in many species, such as rice, poplar and maize, little is known about BURP domain-containing proteins in Medicago. In this study, multipl...