Record ID No. |
4605 |
Author(s) |
Marcel Dicke, Joop J.A. van Loon , 2014 |
Affiliation |
Laboratory of Entomology, Wageningen University, Radix building, Droevendaalsesteeg 1, 6708 PB, Wageningen, The Netherlands, Eamil: marcel.dicke@wur.nl |
Title |
Chemical Ecology of Phytohormones: How Plants Integrate Responses to Complex and Dynamic Environments |
Source. Vol.(no):Page |
Journal of Chemical Ecology 40(7): 653-656p. |
Categories |
Mycorrhiza General |
Subjects |
Biochemistry |
Sub-subjects |
Hormones |
Host |
Plants |
Organism |
Rhizobia, Mycorrhiza, Mammals, Pathogens |
Country |
The Netherlands, Western Europe |
Abstracts |
Plants live together with animals and microorganisms in speciose communities (Stam et al., 2014). The members of these communities range from unicellular microbes to multicellular mammals, from soilborne organisms to airborne organisms and from autotrophs to heterotrophs. Each of the major groups of organisms harbours friends and foes. Animals comprise both herbivores that harm a plant, carnivores that consume herbivores as well as pollinators that mediate plant reproduction (Raguso, 2008; Schoonhoven et al., 2005). Microorganisms include plant pathogens on the one hand and symbionts such as mycorrhiza and rhizobia on the other hand (Pineda et al., 2010; Zamioudis & Pieterse, 2012). Some symbionts even live within the plant resulting in a very intimate relationship (Reinhold-Hurek & Hurek, 2011). Plants of the same species can be competitors but also mating partners and heterospecific plants can be competitors, parasites or can provide associational resistance (Ballare, 2014; Underwood et al., 2014). In addition, plants are exposed to various abiotic stresses such as heat, drought, salt or inundation. Finally, community members may affect a plant’s exposure to abiotic components of the environment, e.g. because they inflict damage resulting in water stress or because neighbouring plants compete for light or nutrients (Ballare, 2014; Holopainen & Gershenzon, 2010). Moreover, the effects of the diverse stress factors are highly dynamic on different time scales ranging from seconds for reduced light availability due to clouds to years or decades for changes in plant community composition in forests. Thus, although an individual plant is firmly rooted in the soil, its environment is highly dynamic and in order to maximize its performance a plant must be able to respond adequately. This means that plants need to maximize interactions with friends and minimize the effects of foes while minimizing costs of doing so. A major dilemma that plants face is to grow or defend (Herms & Mattson, 1992) and sometimes growth or development contributes to defence (Lucas-Barbosa et al., 2013; Pashalidou et al., 2013). These plant responses to external and internal cues need to be coordinated to maximize fitness. Phytohormones comprise the major regulatory components of coordinated plant responses to environmental factors and the vital role they play in plant ecology is the topic of this special issue. |