Publications by authors named "Caitlin M Blank"
Article Synopsis
- Baker's law suggests uniparental reproduction aids island colonization, but the presence of different reproductive forms (like dioecy and gynodioecy) challenges this, particularly in the case of Lycium carolinianum found in North America and Hawaii.
- Controlled crosses in mainland and Hawaiian populations reveal that mainland L. carolinianum is mainly self-incompatible while Hawaiian populations show self-compatibility, alongside reduced genetic diversity at the S-RNase gene associated with self-fertilization.
- Findings indicate that reduced allelic diversity in Hawaii may have led to inbreeding depression and subsequently the development of gynodioecy as a reproductive strategy, highlighting the challenges of colonization
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Premise Of The Study: An association between polyploidy and gender dimorphism has been noted in several plant lineages. Whereas the majority of Lycium species are diploid and have hermaphroditic flowers in cosexual populations, gender dimorphism (gynodioecy, dioecy) has been shown to be uniformly associated with polyploidy in previous studies. Preliminary field observations suggested that some populations of Lycium carolinianum were dimorphic, providing a test of this association.