PRESTON, KATHERINE A.1* and THEODORE G. WONG1,2. 1Dept. of Biological Sciences, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305; 2Dept. of Biological Science, Florida State Univ., Tallahassee, FL 32306. - Plasticity in integrated phenotypes.
Plants are not collections of independent traits. Rather, they are
integrated wholes whose components are interlinked biochemically,
functionally, and developmentally. A trait's response (or lack
thereof) to an environmental stimulus influences, or even constrains,
concurrent responses in other traits, through common control pathways,
compensatory plasticity, or other mechanisms of phenotypic
integration. This symposium explores the tension between single-trait
reaction-norm evolution, and whole-plant trait integration. The papers
describe a range of integrating processes and discuss consequences for
the evolution of integrated responses to the environment.
Key words: constraint, evolution, phenotypic integration, plasticity, reaction norm