Dissertation Research: The Benefits of Induced Plant Responses to Herbivory

卡尔班9701109在草食后诱导的抗性已在许多植物分类群中被广泛记录。研究人员研究了诱导反应的两个方面：1)诱导反应是否提高植物的适合度，2)为什么植物采用诱导反应而不是构成策略。田间种植的一年生植物将在有草食动物的环境中进行实验诱导，并将雄性和雌性健康成分与未诱导的对照植物进行比较。此外，关于诱导反应相对于构成策略的益处的三个非排他性假设将被测试：采用诱导反应的植物是否受益于1)未诱导时节省分配成本，2)未诱导时对专业食草动物不明显，以及3)草食动物的适应速度比受到(持续)保护的植物慢？诱导植物反应的成本很少被发现，其好处在很大程度上被忽视了。这项提案试图填补这些空白。此外，了解诱导防御的生态效益可能有助于保护作物免受减产草食动物的伤害。

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.