Models of Coevolution and Speciation in Plants and Their Pollinators

Kiester, A. Ross; Lande, Russell; Schemske, Douglas W.

doi:10.1086/284265

Cited by 208 publications

(175 citation statements)

References 60 publications

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“…Interestingly, whereas it is sometimes thought that pollen-limited fruit set is a necessary prerequisite for the evolution of specialized pollination (e.g., Schemske 1983;Kiester et al 1984), pollen-limitation appears not to be important for fruit set in either Yucca species or in L. schottii. Pellmyr et al (1996) have suggested that in the absence of pollen-limitation, di erences amonḡ ower visitors in pollination quality (i.e., the genetic contribution to fruit set) can favor the evolution of specialized pollination through selective abortion of fruits of low genetic quality.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

The evolution of obligate pollination mutualisms: senita cactus and senita moth

1998

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We report a new obligate pollination mutualism involving the senita cactus, Lophocereus schottii (Cactaceae, Pachyceereae), and the senita moth, Upiga virescens (Pyralidae, Glaphyriinae) in the Sonoran Desert and discuss the evolution of specialized pollination mutualisms. L. schottii is a night-blooming, self-incompatible columnar cactus. Beginning at sunset, its¯owers are visited by U. virescens females, which collect pollen on specialized abdominal scales, actively deposit pollen on¯ower stigmas, and oviposit a single egg on a¯ower petal. Larvae spend 6 days eating ovules before exiting the fruit and pupating in a cactus branch. Hand-pollination and pollinator exclusion experiments at our study site near Bahia Kino, Sonora, Mexico, revealed that fruit set in L. schottii is likely to be resource limited. About 50% of hand-outcrossed and open-pollinated senita¯owers abort by day 6 after¯ower opening. Results of exclusion experiments indicated that senita moths accounted for 75% of open-pollinated fruit set in 1995 with two species of halictid bees accounting for the remaining fruit set. In 1996,¯owers usually closed before sunrise, and senita moths accounted for at least 90% of open-pollinated fruit set. The net outcome of the senita/senita moth interaction is mutualistic, with senita larvae destroying about 30% of the seeds resulting from pollination by senita moths. Comparison of the senita system with the yucca/yucca moth mutualism reveals many similarities, including reduced nectar production, active pollination, and limited seed destruction. The independent evolution of many of the same features in the two systems suggests that a common pathway exists for the evolution of these highly specialized pollination mutualisms. Nocturnal¯ower opening, self-incompatible breeding systems, and resource-limited fruit production appear to be important during this evolution.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

The evolution of obligate pollination mutualisms: senita cactus and senita moth

1998

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“…(c) Diversification of the yucca-yucca moth pollination mutualism Two long-standing hypotheses about the evolution of obligate pollination mutualism are that they may spur rapid diversification and that the plants and their specialist pollinators may tend to speciate in parallel (Grant 1949;Kiester et al 1984;Hodges & Arnold 1995;Sargent 2004). Our results provide evidence against elevated rates of diversification in Yucca and do not support strict-sense cospeciation in terms of the contemporaneity of diversification.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Testing these hypotheses on a macroevolutionary scale requires sufficient species diversity, information about evolutionary patterns and data on the timing of evolutionary events (Kiester et al 1984;Page 1991). Significant progress has been made in addressing these questions for some sections of the extraordinarily species-rich figs and fig wasps (Weiblen 2004;Machado et al 2005;Ronsted et al 2005;Jiang et al 2006;Marussich & Machado 2007) and for the Glochidion-Epicephala associations (Kawakita et al 2004), but these hypotheses have yet to be tested for the association between yuccas and yucca moths.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pattern and timing of diversification in Yucca (Agavaceae): specialized pollination does not escalate rates of diversification

et al. 2007

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The yucca-yucca moth interaction is one of the most well-known and remarkable obligate pollination mutualisms, and is an important study system for understanding coevolution. Previous research suggests that specialist pollinators can promote rapid diversification in plants, and theoretical work has predicted that obligate pollination mutualism promotes cospeciation between plants and their pollinators, resulting in contemporaneous, parallel diversification. However, a lack of information about the age of Yucca has impeded efforts to test these hypotheses. We used analyses of 4322 AFLP markers and cpDNA sequence data representing six non-protein-coding regions (trnT-trnL, trnL, trnL intron, trnL-trnF, rps16 and clpP intron 2) from all 34 species to recover a consensus organismal phylogeny, and used penalized likelihood to estimate divergence times and speciation rates in Yucca. The results indicate that the pollination mutualism did not accelerate diversification, as Yucca diversity (34 species) is not significantly greater than that of its non-moth-pollinated sister group, Agave sensu latissimus (240 species). The new phylogenetic estimates also corroborate the suggestion that the plant-moth pollination mutualism has at least two origins within the Agavaceae. Finally, age estimates show significant discord between the age of Yucca (ca 6-10 Myr) and the current best estimates for the age of their pollinators (32-40 Myr).

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“…It would also appear that even after "speciation," there is a considerable lag in the fig genes sorting (Borges et al 2008;Grison-Pige et al 2002a,b;van Noort et al 1989;Ware et al 1993). We can expect an evolutionary positive feedback involving wasp choice and the chemistry of the attractant volatiles produced by the host (Kiester et al 1984. Such positive feedback systems are analogous to processes of sexual selection, are thus conducive to speciation, and are therefore likely to promote the generation of taxonomic diversity such as is observed in figs and their wasps (Herre 1996(Herre , 1999Kiester et al 1984;Machado et al 2005).…”

Section: Processes Of Coevolution and Coadaptationmentioning

confidence: 98%

Evolutionary Ecology of Figs and Their Associates: Recent Progress and Outstanding Puzzles

Herre

Jandér²,

Machado³

2008

Annu. Rev. Ecol. Evol. Syst.

320

343

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Over the past decade a proliferation of research has enriched and dramatically altered our understanding of the biology of figs, their pollinator wasps, and the myriad of other organisms that depend on them. Ecologically, this work underscores the crucial role that fig fruits play in sustaining and shaping tropical frugivore communities. More generally, this work addresses several key issues in evolutionary ecology, including evolution of breeding systems (shifts between monoecy and dioecy), factors that promote the stability of mutualisms, precision of adaptation, and trajectories of community assembly and coevolution in systems with multiple interacting partners. Moreover, both the pollinating and nonpollinating wasps associated with figs provide unparalleled opportunities for examining how different population structures can differentially affect sex allocation, kin selection, the evolution of parasite virulence, and many fundamental parameters of population genetics (e.g., levels of genetic variation and rates of silent and nonsilent base substitutions).*%»

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Models of Coevolution and Speciation in Plants and Their Pollinators

Cited by 208 publications

References 60 publications

The evolution of obligate pollination mutualisms: senita cactus and senita moth

The evolution of obligate pollination mutualisms: senita cactus and senita moth

Pattern and timing of diversification in Yucca (Agavaceae): specialized pollination does not escalate rates of diversification

Evolutionary Ecology of Figs and Their Associates: Recent Progress and Outstanding Puzzles

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