What is it about?
The flower colors of different Petunia species depend on their pollinators; red flowers often occur in hummingbird-pollinated species. How did the red color evolve in Petunia exserta? In many species, a single DNA substitution is responsible for color change. However, the evolution of red in Petunia exserta results from substitutions in many genes. We use experiments and genomics to discover the changes.
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Why is it important?
Whether adaptation occurs with a few small but critical changes or many small changes, each with a small effect, is a crucial question in evolutionary biology. Normally flower color changes are associated with a single substitution with a large effect. In Petunia exerta, the red color evolved with many substitutions, each with a small effect, using a never-before-seen mechanism.
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This page is a summary of: Complex evolution of novel red floral color in Petunia, The Plant Cell, April 2021, Oxford University Press (OUP),
DOI: 10.1093/plcell/koab114.
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