TY - JOUR
T1 - The legacy of terrestrial plant evolution on cell wall fine structure
AU - Fangel, Jonatan U.
AU - Sørensen, Klavs Martin
AU - Jacobsen, Niels
AU - Mravec, Jozef
AU - Ahl, Louise Isager
AU - Bakshani, Cassie
AU - Mikkelsen, Maria Dalgaard
AU - Engelsen, Søren Balling
AU - Willats, William
AU - Ulvskov, Peter
PY - 2024
Y1 - 2024
N2 - The evolution of land flora was an epochal event in the history of planet Earth. The success of plants, and especially flowering plants, in colonizing all but the most hostile environments required multiple mechanisms of adaptation. The mainly polysaccharide-based cell walls of flowering plants, which are indispensable for water transport and structural support, are one of the most important adaptations to life on land. Thus, development of vasculature is regarded as a seminal event in cell wall evolution, but the impact of further refinements and diversification of cell wall compositions and architectures on radiation of flowering plant families is less well understood. We approached this from a glyco-profiling perspective and, using carbohydrate microarrays and monoclonal antibodies, studied the cell walls of 287 plant species selected to represent important evolutionary dichotomies and adaptation to a variety of habitats. The results support the conclusion that radiation of flowering plant families was indeed accompanied by changes in cell wall fine structure and that these changes can obscure earlier evolutionary events. Convergent cell wall adaptations identified by our analyses do not appear to be associated with plants with similar lifestyles but that are taxonomically distantly related. We conclude that cell wall structure is linked to phylogeny more strongly than to habitat or lifestyle and propose that there are many approaches of adaptation to any given ecological niche.
AB - The evolution of land flora was an epochal event in the history of planet Earth. The success of plants, and especially flowering plants, in colonizing all but the most hostile environments required multiple mechanisms of adaptation. The mainly polysaccharide-based cell walls of flowering plants, which are indispensable for water transport and structural support, are one of the most important adaptations to life on land. Thus, development of vasculature is regarded as a seminal event in cell wall evolution, but the impact of further refinements and diversification of cell wall compositions and architectures on radiation of flowering plant families is less well understood. We approached this from a glyco-profiling perspective and, using carbohydrate microarrays and monoclonal antibodies, studied the cell walls of 287 plant species selected to represent important evolutionary dichotomies and adaptation to a variety of habitats. The results support the conclusion that radiation of flowering plant families was indeed accompanied by changes in cell wall fine structure and that these changes can obscure earlier evolutionary events. Convergent cell wall adaptations identified by our analyses do not appear to be associated with plants with similar lifestyles but that are taxonomically distantly related. We conclude that cell wall structure is linked to phylogeny more strongly than to habitat or lifestyle and propose that there are many approaches of adaptation to any given ecological niche.
KW - Adaption
KW - CoMPP
KW - Glyco-arrays
KW - Plant cell wall fine structure
KW - Plant cell wall polysaccharides
KW - Plant cell wall types
U2 - 10.1111/pce.14785
DO - 10.1111/pce.14785
M3 - Journal article
C2 - 38173082
SN - 0140-7791
VL - 47
SP - 1238
EP - 1254
JO - Plant, Cell and Environment
JF - Plant, Cell and Environment
IS - 4
ER -