Buzz pollination: A theoretical analysis via scaling invariance.

Nearly half of the bee species can perform a fascinating stereotyped behavior to collect pollen grains by vibrating flowers, known as buzz pollination. During the floral visit, these bees mechanically transfer the vibrations produced by their thoracic indirect flight muscles to the flower anther, inducing the movement of the pollen grains and leading them to be released through a small pore or slit placed at the tip of the anther in poricidal flowers. In such flowers, pollen release is affected by the vibrational behavior of buzzing bees, primarily their duration and velocity amplitude.

A modified petal and stamen dimorphism interact to enhance pollen placement by a buzz-pollinated flower.

Background: Floral adaptations supposedly favour pollen grains to cross the numerous barriers faced during their journey to stigmas. Stamen dimorphism and specialized petals, like the cucculus in the Cassieae tribe (Fabaceae), are commonly observed in flowers that offer only pollen as a resource for bee pollinators. Here, we experimentally investigated whether the stamen dimorphism and cucculus enhance pollen placement on the bee's body.

Pollen Wars: Explosive Pollination Removes Pollen Deposited from Previously Visited Flowers.

AbstractPollen grains from different plants potentially compete for ovule access because flowers produce many more pollen grains than ovules. Pollen competition could occur on pollinators, where there is finite space for pollen placement. Here, we explore the explosive pollen deposition in (Lamiaceae, a perennial flowering plant native to South America that is frequently visited by hummingbirds) and determine whether it can improve male performance by reducing pollen loads deposited by previously visited flowers.

MelastomaTRAITs 1.0: A database of functional traits in Melastomataceae, a large pantropical angiosperm family.

The recent availability of open-access repositories of functional traits has revolutionized trait-based approaches in ecology and evolution. Nevertheless, the underrepresentation of tropical regions and lineages remains a pervasive bias in plant functional trait databases, which constrains large-scale assessments of plant ecology, evolution, and biogeography. Here, we present MelastomaTRAITs 1.

Data standardization of plant-pollinator interactions.

Background: Animal pollination is an important ecosystem function and service, ensuring both the integrity of natural systems and human well-being. Although many knowledge shortfalls remain, some high-quality data sets on biological interactions are now available. The development and adoption of standards for biodiversity data and metadata has promoted great advances in biological data sharing and aggregation, supporting large-scale studies and science-based public policies.

Investigation of pollen release by poricidal anthers using mathematical billiards.

Buzz pollination is described using a mathematical model considering a billiard approach. Applications to a rough morphology of a typical poricidal anther of a tomato flower (Solanum lycopersicum) experiencing vibrations applied by a bumblebee (Bombus terrestris) are made. The anther is described by a rectangular billiard with a pore on its tip while the borders are perturbed by specific oscillations according to the vibrational properties of the bumblebee.

Intrafloral Color Modularity in a Bee-Pollinated Orchid.

Flower color has been studied in different ecological levels of organization, from individuals to communities. However, it is unclear how color is structured at the intrafloral level. In bee-pollinated flowers, the unidirectional gradient in color purity and pollen mimicry are two common processes to explain intrafloral color patterns.

Bee-Mediated Selection Favors Floral Sex Specialization in a Heterantherous Species: Strategies to Solve the Pollen Dilemma.

Animal-pollinated plants show a broad variation in floral morphology traits and gametophyte production within populations. Thus, floral traits related to plant reproduction and sexuality are usually exposed to pollinator-mediated selection. Such selective pressures may be even stronger in heterantherous and pollen flowers, in which pollen contributes to both bee feeding and pollination, overcoming the "pollen dilemma" or the inability to perform both functions simultaneously.

Biomechanical properties of a buzz-pollinated flower.

Approximately half of all bee species use vibrations to remove pollen from plants with diverse floral morphologies. In many buzz-pollinated flowers, these mechanical vibrations generated by bees are transmitted through floral tissues, principally pollen-containing anthers, causing pollen to be ejected from small openings (pores or slits) at the tip of the stamen. Despite the importance of substrate-borne vibrations for both bees and plants, few studies to date have characterized the transmission properties of floral vibrations.

How flower colour signals allure bees and hummingbirds: a community-level test of the bee avoidance hypothesis.

Colour signals are the main floral trait for plant-pollinator communication. Owing to visual specificities, flower visitors exert different selective pressures on flower colour signals of plant communities. Although they evolved to attract pollinators, matching their visual sensitivity and colour preferences, floral signals may also evolve to avoid less efficient pollinators and antagonistic flower visitors.

Flower colour within communities shifts from overdispersed to clustered along an alpine altitudinal gradient.

Altitudinal gradients are interesting models to test the effect of biotic and abiotic drivers of floral colour diversity, since an increase in UV irradiance, decrease of pollinator availability and shifts from bee- to fly-pollination in high relative to low altitudes are expected. We tested the effect of altitude and phylogeny, using several chromatic and achromatic colour properties, UV reflectance and pollinators' discrimination capacity (Apis mellifera, Bombus terrestris, Musca domestica and Eristalis tenax), to understand the floral colour diversity in an alpine altitudinal gradient. All colour properties were weakly related to phylogeny.

Trees as huge flowers and flowers as oversized floral guides: the role of floral color change and retention of old flowers in Tibouchina pulchra.

Floral color changes and retention of old flowers are frequently combined phenomena restricted to the floral guide or single flowers in few-flowered inflorescences. They are thought to increase the attractiveness over long distances and to direct nearby pollinators toward the rewarding flowers. In Tibouchina pulchra, a massively flowering tree, the whole flower changes its color during anthesis.