Biomass allocation in response to accession recognition in depends on nutrient availability and plant age.

Many organisms have evolved to identify and respond to differences in genetic relatedness between conspecifics, allowing them to select between competitive and facilitative strategies to improve fitness. Due to their sessile nature, plants frequently draw from the same pool of nutrients, and the ability to limit competition between closely related conspecifics would be advantageous. Studies with have confirmed that plants can detect variations at the accession level and alter their root system architecture (RSA) in response, presumably for regulating nutrient uptake.