Abstract
The evolutionary questions studied in apomictic plants and parthenogenetic animals are often the same. This chapter gives a basic introduction to apomixis in flowering plants, in order to make the botanical apomixis literature more accessible to non-specialists. The focus is on the differences and similarities with parthenogenetic animals. The following topics are briefly discussed: 1. apomixis should not include vegetative reproduction, 2. apomixis is a modification of sexual reproduction 3. different mechanisms of apomixis, 4. the role of endosperm development 5. causes of apomixis 6. male function in apomicts 7. intra-clonal variation 8. the phylogenetic distribution of apomixis and 9. constraints in the evolution of apomixis. At the end of the chapter, suggestions for further reading are given.
Keywords
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Archetti M (2004) Recombination and loss of complementation: a more than two-fold cost for parthenogenesis. J Evol Biol 17: 1084–1097
Asker SE, Jerling L (1992) Apomixis in plants. CRC press, Boca Raton
Bayer RJ, Chandler GT (2007) Evolution of polyploid agamic complexes: a case study using the Catipes group of Antennaria, including the A. rosea complex (Asteraceae: Gnaphalieae). In: Hörandl E, Grossniklaus U, van Dijk PJ, Sharbel TF (eds) Apomixis: evolution, mechanisms and perspectives. ARG Gantner Verlag KG, Lichtenstein, pp. 317–336
Bicknell RA, Lambie SC, Butler RC (2003) Quantification of progeny classes in two facultatively apomictic accessions of Hieracium. Hereditas 138: 11–20
Bicknell RA, Koltunow AM (2004) Understanding apomixis: recent advances and remaining conundrums. Plant Cell 16: S228–S245
Beukeboom LW, Weinzierl RP, Reed KM, Michiels NK (1996) Distribution and origin of chromosomal races in the freshwater planarian Dugesia polychroa (Turbellaria: Tricladida). Hereditas 124: 7–15
Calderini O, Chang SB, de Jong H, Bustil A, Paolocci F, Arcioni S, de Vries SC, Abma-Henkens MHC, Klein Lankhorst RH, Donnison IS, Pupilli F (2006) Molecular cytogenetics and DNA sequence analysis of an apomixis-linked BAC in Paspalum simplex reveal a non pericentromere location and partial microcolinearity with rice. Theor Appl Genet 112: 1179–1191
Carman JG (1997) Asynchronous expression of duplicate genes in angiosperms may cause apomixis, bispory, tetraspory, and polyembryony. Biol J Linn Soc 61: 51–94
Carman JG (2007) Do duplicate genes cause apomixis? In: Hörandl E, Grossniklaus U, van Dijk PJ, Sharbel TF (eds), Apomixis: evolution, mechanisms and perspectives. ARG Gantner Verlag KG, Lichtenstein, pp. 169–194
Catanach AS, Erasmuson SK, Podivinsky E, Jordan BR, Bicknell R (2006) Deletion mapping of genetic regions associated with apomixis in Hieracium. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 103: 18650–18655
Chaboudez P (1994) Patterns of clonal variation in skeleton weed (Chondrilla juncea), an apomictic species. Austr J Bot 42: 283–295
Chapman H, Brown J (2001) ‘Thawing’ of ‘frozen’ variation in an adventive, facultatively apomictic, clonal weed. Plant Species Biol 16: 107–118
Conner JA, Goel S, Gunawan G, Cordonnier-Pratt MM, Johnson VE, Liang C, Wang H, Pratt LH, Mullet JE, Debarry J, Yang L, Bennetzen JL, Klein PE, Ozias-Akins P (2008) Sequence analysis of bacterial artificial chromosome clones from the apospory-specific genomic region of Pennisetum and Cenchrus. Plant Physiol 147: 1396–411
Dujardin M, Hanna WW (1989) Developing apomictic pearl millet – characterization of a BC3 plant. J Genet Breed 43: 145–51
Engelstädter J (2008) Constraints on the evolution of asexual reproduction. Bioassays 30: 1138–1150
Ernst A (1918) Bastadierung als Ursache der Apogamie im Pflanzenreich. Fischer, Jena. (Hybridization as cause of apogamy in the plant kingdom)
Gehring M, Choi Y, Fischer RL (2004) Imprinting and seed development. Plant Cell 16: S203–S213
Haig D, Westoby M (1989) Parent-specific gene expression and the triploid endosperm. Am Nat 134: 147–155
Haig D, Westoby M (1991) Genomic imprinting in endosperm: its effect on seed development in crosses between species, and between different ploidies of the same species, and its implications for the evolution of apomixis. Philos Trans R Soc B 333: 1–13
Harlan JR, De Wet JMJ (1975) On Ö. Winge and a prayer: the origins of polyploidy. Bot Rev 41: 361–390
Hebert PDN (1987) Genotypic characteristics of cyclic parthenogens, their obligately asexual derivatives. In: Stearns SC (ed) The evolution of sex and its consequences. Birkhäuser, Basel, pp. 175–195
Holm S, Ghatnekar L, Bengtsson BO (1997) Selfing and outcrossing but no apomixis in two natural populations of diploid Potentilla argentea. J Evol Biol 10: 343–352
Hörandl E (2006) The complex causality of geographical parthenogenesis. New Phytol 171: 525–538
Hörandl E, Grossniklaus U, van Dijk PJ, Sharbel TF (eds) (2007) Apomixis: evolution, mechanisms and perspectives. ARG Gantner Verlag KG, Lichtenstein
Huh JH, Bauer MJ, Hsieh T-F, Fischer R (2007) Endosperm gene imprinting and seed development. Curr Opin Genet Dev 17: 480–485
Kantama L, Sharbel TF, Schranz ME, Mitchell-Olds T, de Vries S, De Jong JH (2007) Diploid apomicts of the Boechera holboellii complex display large-scale chromosome substitutions and aberrant chromosomes. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 104: 14026–14031
King LM, Schaal BA (1990) Genotypic variation within asexual lineages of Taraxacum officinale. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 87: 998–1002
Koltunow AM, Grossniklaus U (2003) Apomixis: a developmental perspective. Annu Rev Plant Biol 54: 547–574
Lively CM (1987) Evidence from a New Zealand snail for the maintenance of sex by parasitism. Nature 328: 519–521
LeRoux JJ, Wieczorek AM, Wright MG, Tran CT (2007) Super-genotype: global monoclonality defies the odds of nature. PLoS ONE 2: e590
Matzk F, Meister A, Schubert I (2000) An efficient screen for reproductive pathways using mature seeds of monocots and dicots. Plant J 21: 97–108
Mes THM, Kuperus P, Kirschner J, Stepanek J, Storchova H (2002) Detection of genetically divergent clone mates in apomictic dandelions. Mol Ecol 11: 253–265
Mogie M (1992) The evolution of asexual reproduction in plants. Chapman and Hall, London
Moran NA (1992) The evolution of aphid life-cycles. Annu Rev Entomol 37: 321–348
Naumova TN (1993) Apomixis in angiosperms. Nucellar and integumentary embryony. CRC Press, Boca Raton
Naumova TN, Van der Laak J, Osadtchiy J, Matzk F, Kravtchenko A, Bergervoet J, Ramulu KS, Boutilier K (2001) Reproductive development in apomictic populations of Arabis holboellii (Brassicaceae) Sex Plant Reprod 14: 195–200
Nogler GA (1984a) Genetics of apospory in apomictic Ranunculus auricomus. V. Conclusion. Bot Helv 92: 411–423
Nogler GA (1984b) Gametophytic apomixis. In: Johri BM (ed) Embryology of angiosperms. Springer, Berlin, pp. 475–518
Nogler GA (2006) The lesser-known Mendel: his experiments on Hieracium. Genetics 172: 1–6
Nogler GA (2007) The discovery of parthogenesis: a long journey to the truth. In: Hörandl E, Grossniklaus U, van Dijk PJ, Sharbel TF (eds) Apomixis: evolution, mechanisms and perspectives. ARG Gantner Verlag KG, Lichtenstein, pp. 25–35
Noyes RD, Baker R, Mai B (2007) Mendelian segregation for two-factor apomixis in Erigeron annuus(Asteraceae). Heredity 98: 92–98
Noyes RD, Rieseberg LH (2000) Two independent loci control agamospermy (apomixis) in the triploid flowering plant Erigeron annuus. Genetics 155: 379–390
Ozias-Akins P, Van Dijk PJ (2007) Mendelian genetics of apomixis in plants. Annu Rev Genet 41: 509–537
Paland S, Colbourne JK, Lynch M (2005) Evolutionary history of contagious asexuality in Daphnia pulex. Evolution 59: 800–813
Paun O, Hörandl E (2006) Evolution of hypervariable microsatellites in apomictic polyploid lineages of Ranunculus carpaticola: directional bias at dinucleotide loci. Genetics 174: 387–398
Pichot C, El Maātaoui M, Raddi S, Raddi P (2001) Surrogate mother for endangered Cupressus. Nature 412: 39
Pringle P (2007) Day of the dandelion. Simon and Schuster, New York
Richards AJ (2003) Apomixis in flowering plants: an overview. Philos Trans R Soc B Biol Sci 358: 1085–1093
Roetman E, Den Nijs JCM, Sterk AA (1988) Distribution and habitat range of diploid, sexual dandelions (Taraxacum section Vulgaria), a Central European flora element in the Netherlands. Acta Bot Neerl 37: 81–94
Rutishauser A (1948) Pseudogamie und Polymorphie in der Gattung Potentilla. Julius Klaus Stiftung für Vererb Forsch 23: 267–424
Sanderson M, Doyle JJA (2001) Sources of error and confidence intervals in estimating the age of angiosperms from rbcL and 18S rDNA data. Am J Bot 88: 1499–1516
Savidan Y (1980) Chromosomal and embryological analyses in sexual X apomictic hybrids of Panicum maximum Jacq. Theor Appl Genet 57: 153–156
Savidan Y (2000) Apomixis: genetics and breeding. Plant Breed Rev 18: 13–85
Savidan Y, Carman JG, Dresselhaus T (eds) (2001) The flowering of apomixis; from mechanisms to genetic engineering. Mexico, DF: Cimmyt, IRD European Commission DG VI (FAIR)
Schultz RJ (1967) Gynogenesis and triploidy in the viviparous fish Poeciliopsis. Science 157: 1564–1567
Spillane C, Curtis MD, Grossniklaus U. (2004) Apomixis technology development – virgin births in farmers’ fields? Nat Biotechnol 22: 687–691
Stebbins GL (1950) Variation and evolution in plants. Columbia University Press, New York
Van der Hulst RGM, Mes THM, Den Nijs JCM, Bachmann K (2000) Amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) markers reveal that population structure of triploid dandelions (Taraxacum officinale) exhibits both clonality and recombination. Mol Ecol 9: 1–8
Van Dijk PJ (2003) Ecological and evolutionary opportunities of apomixis: insights from Taraxacumand Chondrilla. Philos Trans R Soc B Biol Sci 358: 1113–1121
Van Dijk PJ, Vijverberg K (2005) The significance of apomixis in the evolution of the angiosperms: a reappraisal. Regnum Vegetabile 143. Bakker FT, Chatrou LW, Gravendeel B and Pelser PB (eds) Plant species-level systematics: new perspectives on pattern and process. Koeltz Scientific Books, Koeningstein, pp. 101–116
Whitton J, Sears CJ, Baack EJ, Otto SP (2008) The dynamic nature of apomixis in the angiosperms. Int J Plant Sci 169: 169–182
Wu W, Zheng YL, Chen L, Wei YM, Yan ZH (2005) Genetic diversity among the germplasm resources of the genus Houttuynia Thunb. in China based on RAMP markers. Gen Res Crop Evol 52: 473–482
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Glossary
- Adventitious embryony:
-
The formation of somatic next to sexual embryos.
- Agamospermy:
-
asexual reproduction by seed
- Apomixis (in plants):
-
asexual reproduction through seeds
- Apospory:
-
In addition to the normal reduced megagametophyte (n), a second but unreduced (2n) megagametophyte is formed from a non-spore cell (aposporous initial).
- Autogamy:
-
Also called selfing. The fusion of egg cells and pollen grains produced by the same individual.
- Autonomous apomixis:
-
The evolution of autonomous endosperm development in some apomictic plants.
- Diplospory:
-
a normal reductional meiosis is replaced by a non-reductional division. Two unreduced megaspores (2n) are produced, of which one degenerates and the other develops into an unreduced gametophyte with an unreduced egg cell.
- Facultative apomixis:
-
the production of a mixture of different progeny types in apomictic plants which is possible because apomeiosis and parthenogenesis can be uncoupled.
- Gametophytic apomixis:
-
can consist of diplospory and apospory and is strongly correlated with polyploidy
- Nucellar embryony:
- Pseudogamy, pseudogamous apomixis:
-
the endosperm develops only after fertilization of the central cell.
- Sporophytic apomixis:
-
Somatic embryos are formed within the sporophytic tissue that surrounds the gametophyte. These cells do not enter a gametophytic phase but remain sporophytically and produce an embryo directly (somatic embryo).
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2009 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Van Dijk, P. (2009). Apomixis: Basics for Non-botanists. In: Schön, I., Martens, K., Dijk, P. (eds) Lost Sex. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-2770-2_3
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-2770-2_3
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-90-481-2769-6
Online ISBN: 978-90-481-2770-2
eBook Packages: Biomedical and Life SciencesBiomedical and Life Sciences (R0)