The phenotypic responses of functional traits in natural populations are driven by genetic diversity and phenotypic plasticity. These two mechanisms enable trees to cope with rapid climate change. We studied two European temperate tree species (sessile oak and European beech), focusing on (i) in situ variations of leaf functional traits (morphological and physiological) along two altitudinal gr...

Stigma traits are very important for hybrid seed production in Oryza sativa, which is a self-pollinated crop; however, the genetic mechanism controlling the traits is poorly understood. In this study, we investigated the phenotypic data of 227 accessions across 2 years and assessed their genotypic variation with 249 simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers. By combining phenotypic and genotypic dat...

Males from different populations of the same species often differ in their sexually selected traits. Variation in sexually selected traits can be attributed to sexual selection if phenotypic divergence matches the direction of sexual selection gradients among populations. However, phenotypic divergence of sexually selected traits may also be influenced by other factors, such as natural selectio...

Drosophila montana, a species of the Drosophila virilis group, has distributed around the northern hemisphere. Phylogeographic analyses of two North American and one Eurasian population of this species offer a good background for the studies on the extent of variation in phenotypic traits between populations as well as for tracing the selection pressures likely to play a role in character diver...

Differences in plant and herbivore community assemblages between exotic and native ranges may select for different levels of plant traits in invasive and native populations of plant species. Little is currently known of how herbivores may mediate competitive and facilitative interactions between invasive and native populations of plant species and their plant neighbors. Here, we conducted a com...

Soybean (Glycine max L.)-breeding programs aim to develop cultivars with high grain yields and high tolerance to Asian soybean rust (Phakopsora pachyrhizi). Considering that the traits targeted for breeding are mainly quantitative in nature, knowledge of associations between traits allows the breeder to formulate indirect selection strategies. In this study, we investigated phenotypic, genotypi...

Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) are ecologically important root symbionts of most terrestrial plants. Ecological studies of AMF have concentrated on differences between species; largely assuming little variability within AMF species. Although AMF are clonal, they have evolved to contain a surprisingly high within-species genetic variability, and genetically different nuclei can coexist withi...