Dissertation Research: The Benefits of Induced Plant Responses to Herbivory

在许多植物分类群中，草食诱导抗性已被广泛记录。研究者研究了诱导的两个方面：1)诱导反应是否增加植物适应性；2)为什么植物采用诱导反应而不是本构策略。田间种植的一年生植物将在有食草动物的环境中进行实验性诱导，并将雄性和雌性适应度成分与未诱导的对照植物进行比较。此外，将测试诱导反应优于构成策略的三个非排他假设：采用诱导反应的植物是否从以下方面获益：1)在未诱导时节省分配成本；2)在未诱导时对专业食草动物不明显；3)与构成（持续）防御的植物相比，食草动物的适应速度较慢？诱导植物反应的成本很少被发现，而其益处在很大程度上被忽视了。这项提议试图填补这些空白。此外，了解诱导防御的生态效益将有助于保护作物免受减少产量的食草动物的侵害。

Karban 9701109 Induced resistance following herbivory has been broadly documented across many taxa of plants. The investigators examine two aspects of induction 1) whether induced responses increase plant fitness, and 2) why plants employ induced responses over constitutive strategies. Field-grown annual plants will be experimentally induced in an environment with herbivores and male and female fitness components will be compared to uninduced control plants. In addition, three non-exclusive hypotheses for the benefits of induced responses over constitutive strategies will be tested: Do plants that employ induced responses benefit from 1) saving allocation costs when not induced, 2) not being apparent to specialist herbivores when not induced, and 3) having slower adapting herbivores than plants that are constitutively (continuously) defended? Costs of induced plant responses have rarely been found and the benefits have been largely ignored. This proposal attempts to fill these gaps. Additionally, understanding the ecological benefits of induced defenses will be potentially useful in the protection of crop plants from yield-reducing herbivores.