Variation in snow cover drives differences in frost resistance in seedlings of the alpine herb Aciphylla glacialis

Briceño, Verõnica F.; Harris-Pascal, Daniel; Nicotra, Adrienne B.; Williams, Emlyn; Ball, Marilyn C.

doi:10.1016/j.envexpbot.2014.02.011

Cited by 42 publications

(52 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…1 and 2). In contrast, previous studies have demonstrated differences in plastic responses along elevation gradients and associated these with differing selection pressures at each elevation, such as increased temperature [24,25,42], increased frost risk due to earlier melting snow [43][44][45], and competition from upward shift in low elevation alpine plants [46]. Likewise, past research has assessed elevation based changes in traits such as; growth rate, biomass [29], leaf size [20], stomatal conductance [30] and carbon isotope discrimination [47].…”

Section: Water Use Efficiencymentioning

confidence: 78%

“…Among Australian alpine herbs, lower elevation populations of Wahlenbergia ceracea and Aciphylla glacialis have been shown to have a greater plasticity in a range of traits in response to warming temperatures [24] and a greater ability to acclimate to cold temperatures than their higher elevation counterparts [25]. In both cases, greater plasticity resulted in a fitness advantage [24,25].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…With regards to intra-specific variation attributable to elevation, we considered two alternative hypotheses; a) that we would observe similar patterns of plasticity for water availability as previously observed for temperature along the elevation gradient [24,25]. As such, plants sourced from environmentally more heterogeneous lower elevations are predicted to display greater plasticity and more evidence of adaptive plastic responses.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In both cases, greater plasticity resulted in a fitness advantage [24,25]. However, it is possible the evolution of adaptive responses for one abiotic variable may be maladaptive or neutral for another [26,27].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For two of these species prior studies have shown such variation in plastic response to temperature [24,25]. We grew plants under common garden conditions exposed to either well-watered or water-limited conditions and examined plant functional traits that are known to vary as a function of water availability, including morphological and physiological traits [28].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Phenotypic plasticity and water availability: responses of alpine herb species along an elevation gradient

Geange

Briceño

Aitken

et al. 2017

Clim Chang Responses

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Background: Alpine regions are particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change. The Australian Alps are potentially more so than other mountain regions, as they cover a very small geographic area (<0.05% of mainland Australia), with a low maximum elevation (2228 m). Therefore, response to climate change will be primarily determined by the ability of species to survive in-situ through local adaptation or phenotypic plasticity. Existing climate change models project not only warming but increasingly variable precipitation and snow cover across the Australian Alps. Thus, plasticity in water use traits may become increasingly important for the establishment and persistence of Australian alpine plants. Given that plants from lower elevations inhabit a more heterogeneous environment with more frequent frosts, greater temperature extremes, and higher evapotranspiration, we predict plasticity -and particularly adaptive plasticity -may be more common at low relative to high elevation. To test these predictions we investigated the extent of plasticity and the adaptive value thereof in water use traits in three herbaceous Australian alpine plant species. Seeds were collected from low and high elevation alpine sites and grown at ample and limiting water availability under common-garden conditions. For morphological and physiological traits, we compared both their means and phenotypic plasticity across treatments and elevations.

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Section: Water Use Efficiencymentioning

confidence: 78%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Phenotypic plasticity and water availability: responses of alpine herb species along an elevation gradient

Geange

Briceño

Aitken

et al. 2017

Clim Chang Responses

Self Cite

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Adaptive plasticity and epigenetic variation in response to warming in an Alpine plant

Nicotra

Segal

Hoyle

et al. 2015

Ecology and Evolution

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112

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Environmentally induced phenotypic plasticity may be a critical component of response to changing environments. We examined local differentiation and adaptive phenotypic plasticity in response to elevated temperature in half-sib lines collected across an elevation gradient for the alpine herb, Wahlenbergia ceracea. Using Amplified Fragment Length Polymorphism (AFLP), we found low but significant genetic differentiation between low- and high-elevation seedlings, and seedlings originating from low elevations grew faster and showed stronger temperature responses (more plasticity) than those from medium and high elevations. Furthermore, plasticity was more often adaptive for plants of low-elevation origin and maladaptive for plants of high elevation. With methylation sensitive-AFLP (MS-AFLP), we revealed an increase in epigenetic variation in response to temperature in low-elevation seedlings. Although we did not find significant direct correlations between MS-AFLP loci and phenotypes, our results demonstrate that adaptive plasticity in temperature response to warming varies over fine spatial scales and suggest the involvement of epigenetic mechanisms in this response.

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Microclimate predicts frost hardiness of alpineArabidopsis thalianapopulations better than elevation

Lampei

Wunder

Wilhalm

et al. 2019

Ecology and Evolution

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In mountain regions, topological differences on the microscale can strongly affect microclimate and may counteract the average effects of elevation, such as decreasing temperatures. While these interactions are well understood, their effect on plant adaptation is understudied.We investigated winter frost hardiness of Arabidopsis thaliana accessions originating from 13 sites along altitudinal gradients in the Southern Alps during three winters on an experimental field station on the Swabian Jura and compared levels of frost damage with the observed number of frost days and the lowest temperature in eight collection sites.We found that frost hardiness increased with elevation in a log‐linear fashion. This is consistent with adaptation to a higher frequency of frost conditions, but also indicates a decreasing rate of change in frost hardiness with increasing elevation. Moreover, the number of frost days measured with temperature loggers at the collection sites correlated much better with frost hardiness than the elevation of collection sites, suggesting that populations were adapted to their local microclimate. Notably, the variance in frost days across sites increased exponentially with elevation. Together, our results suggest that strong microclimate heterogeneity of high alpine environments can preserve functional genetic diversity among small populations.Synthesis: Here, we tested how plant populations differed in their adaptation to frost exposure along an elevation gradient and whether microsite temperatures improve the prediction of frost hardiness. We found that local temperatures, particularly the number of frost days, are a better predictor of the frost hardiness of plants than elevation. This reflects a substantial variance in frost frequency between sites at similar high elevations. We conclude that high mountain regions harbor microsites that differ in their local microclimate and thereby can preserve a high functional genetic diversity among them. Therefore, high mountain regions have the potential to function as a refugium in times of global change.

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Variation in snow cover drives differences in frost resistance in seedlings of the alpine herb Aciphylla glacialis

Cited by 42 publications

References 38 publications

Phenotypic plasticity and water availability: responses of alpine herb species along an elevation gradient

Phenotypic plasticity and water availability: responses of alpine herb species along an elevation gradient

Adaptive plasticity and epigenetic variation in response to warming in an Alpine plant

Microclimate predicts frost hardiness of alpineArabidopsis thalianapopulations better than elevation

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