Richard P Shefferson, D Lee Taylor, Michael Weiss, Sigisfredo Garnica, Melissa K McCormick, Seth Adams, Hope M Gray, Jack W McFarland, Tiiu Kull, Kadri Tali, Tomohisa Yukawa, Takayuki Kawahara, Kazumitsu Miyoshi, Yung-I Lee
Although coevolution is acknowledged to occur in nature, coevolutionary patterns in symbioses not involving species-to-species relationships are poorly understood. Mycorrhizal plants are thought to be too generalist to coevolve with their symbiotic fungi; yet some plants, including some orchids, exhibit strikingly narrow mycorrhizal specificity. Here, we assess the evolutionary history of mycorrhizal specificity in the lady's slipper orchid genus, Cypripedium. We sampled 90 populations of 15 taxa across three continents, using DNA methods to identify fungal symbionts and quantify mycorrhizal specificity...
June 2007: Evolution; International Journal of Organic Evolution