ADVANCES IN MODERN ECOLOGY AND EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY TRANSPOSABLE ELEMENT CONTENT IN YELLOW STARTHISTLE

Abstract

Species invasions can be influenced by various ecological and genomic factors. One contribution that may influence the ability for new variation to arise comes from transposable element (TE) activity. TEs may provide organisms with favorable novel genomic mutations that allow for adaptation. This study investigates the contribution of TE content in Centaurea solstitialis, commonly known as yellow starthistle (YST). YST is known for its invasive ability in the Americas, where it has established large invaded ranges. In this study, seeds from native and invaded populations were reared in a common environment and traits involving growth, reproduction, and genome size were measured. Correlations between genome size and growth rate, dry aboveground biomass, number of flowering heads, and days to first start flowering were tested. In addition bioinformatic analysis of genomic data from a native and invading YST were used to estimate average number and average length of long terminal repeat (LTR) sequences. Results from genomic analysis show substantial amounts of intraspecific size variation in genomic content, commonly attributed by class I TE activity, as well as larger genome size being positively correlated with longer generation times. These results demonstrate that TE activity contributing to genome size correlates with important ecological traits.