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Plant Sciences

2021

William & Mary

Articles 1 - 2 of 2

Full-Text Articles in Biology

Characterizing The Microbiome Of Floral Nectar Of Asclepias Syriaca And Other Asclepias Species, Heather Natterer May 2021

Characterizing The Microbiome Of Floral Nectar Of Asclepias Syriaca And Other Asclepias Species, Heather Natterer

Undergraduate Honors Theses

In recent decades, Danaus plexippus (the monarch butterfly) has experienced a drastic decrease in population size due to urbanization, climate change, and habitat loss. The primary habitat and food source of D. plexippus is plant species that are within the genus Asclepias (milkweed). The preservation and propagation of Asclepias spp. is necessary to combat D. plexippus’s population declines. A plant’s reproductive success is dependent upon its ability to attract pollinators, which is linked to the plant’s nectar qualities. We propose that, in turn, these nectar qualities may be influenced by the nectar microbiome. This study aims to better understand the …


The Regulatory Network For Petal Anthocyanin Pigmentation Is Shaped By The Myb5a/Negan Transcription Factor In Mimulus, Xingyu Zheng, Kuenzang Om, Kimmy A. Stanton, (...), Gregory D. Conradi Smith, Joshua R. Puzeyn, Et Al. Feb 2021

The Regulatory Network For Petal Anthocyanin Pigmentation Is Shaped By The Myb5a/Negan Transcription Factor In Mimulus, Xingyu Zheng, Kuenzang Om, Kimmy A. Stanton, (...), Gregory D. Conradi Smith, Joshua R. Puzeyn, Et Al.

Arts & Sciences Articles

Much of the visual diversity of angiosperms is due to the frequent evolution of novel pigmentation patterns in flowers. The gene network responsible for anthocyanin pigmentation, in particular, has become a model for investigating how genetic changes give rise to phenotypic innovation. In the monkeyflower genus Mimulus, an evolutionarily recent gain of petal lobe anthocyanin pigmentation in M. luteus var. variegatus was previously mapped to genomic region pla2. Here, we use sequence and expression analysis, followed by transgenic manipulation of gene expression, to identify MYB5a—orthologous to the NEGAN transcriptional activator from M. lewisii—as the gene responsible …