A5001976276- Plant and animal studies
- Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies
- Plant Taxonomy and Phylogenetics
- Plant Parasitism and Resistance
- Genetic diversity and population structure
- Mycorrhizal Fungi and Plant Interactions
- Moringa oleifera research and applications
- Botany, Ecology, and Taxonomy Studies
- Sunflower and Safflower Cultivation
- Plant Virus Research Studies
- Calcium Carbonate Crystallization and Inhibition
- Botanical Research and Applications
- Fungal Biology and Applications
- Genomics, phytochemicals, and oxidative stress
- Marine and coastal plant biology
Duke University
2013-2021
St. Mary's College of Maryland
2018-2019
Mount Holyoke College
2011
In plants, ecologically important life history traits often display clinal patterns of population divergence. Such can provide strong evidence for spatially varying selection across environmental gradients but also may result from nonselective processes, such as genetic drift, bottlenecks and restricted gene flow. Comparison differentiation in quantitative (measured Q(ST) ) with neutral molecular markers F(ST) provides a useful tool understanding the relative importance adaptive nonadaptive...
Plants employ highly variable chemical defenses against a broad community of herbivores, which vary in their susceptibilities to specific compounds. Variation within the plant has been found many species; ecological and evolutionary influences on this variation, however, are less well-understood. One central theory describing allocation is Optimal Defense Hypothesis (ODH), predicts that will be concentrated tissues high fitness value plant. Although ODH repeatedly supported vegetative...
Ecological differentiation (ED) between sexual and asexual organisms may permit the maintenance of reproductive polymorphism. Several studies sexual/asexual ED in plants have shown that geographic ranges asexuals extend beyond those sexuals, often areas higher latitude or elevation. But very little is known about at fine scales, wherein coexistence sexuals be permitted by differential niche occupation.We used 149 populations apomictic lineages genus Boechera (rock cress) collected across a...
When pleiotropy is present, genetic correlations may constrain the evolution of ecologically important traits. We used a quantitative genetics approach to investigate constraints on secondary metabolites in wild mustard, Boechera stricta. Much variation chemical composition glucosinolates B. stricta controlled by single locus, BCMA1/3. In large-scale common garden experiment under natural conditions, we quantified fitness and glucosinolate profile two leaf types fruits. estimated variances...
The interactions between plants and enemies employ a variety of mechanisms, which in turn affect the long‐term evolutionary histories interacting species. Different patterns determine not only selective forces acting on individual genes, but also flexibility rapidity evolution response to new threats. New genomic techniques allowing large‐scale comparisons within species demonstrate that defence genes are highly variable experience very different even recently diverged Similar shared...