Prieto-Benítez Samuel, Dötterl Stefan, Giménez-Benavides Luis
Dep. Biología y Geología, Física y Química Inorgánica, Universidad Rey Juan Carlos-ESCET, C/ Tulipán, s/n., 28933, Móstoles, Madrid, Spain.
Department of Ecology & Evolution, Plant Ecology, University of Salzburg, 345020, Hellbrunnerstr, Salzburg, Austria.
J Chem Ecol. 2015 Dec;41(12):1095-104. doi: 10.1007/s10886-015-0645-z. Epub 2015 Nov 4.
The composition of flower scent and the timing of emission are crucial for chemical communication between plants and their pollinators; hence, they are key traits for the characterization of pollination syndromes. In many plants, however, plants are assigned to a syndrome based on inexpensive to measure flower traits, such as color, time of flower opening, and shape. We compared day and night scents from 31 Sileneae species and tested for quantitative and semi-quantitative differences in scent among species classified a priori as diurnal or nocturnal. As most Sileneae species are not only visited by either diurnal or nocturnal animals as predicted by their syndrome, we hypothesized that, even if flower scent were preferentially emitted during the day or at night, most species also would emit some scents during the opposing periods of the day. This phenomenon would contribute to the generalized assemblage of flower visitors usually observed in Sileneae species. We found that diel variations of scent often were not congruent with the syndrome definition, but could partially be explained by taxonomy and sampling times. Most species emitted compounds with attractive potential to insects during both the night and day. Our results highlight the current opinion that syndromes are not watertight compartments evolved to exclude some flower visitors. Thus, important information may be lost when scents are collected either during day- or night-time, depending on the a priori classification of the species as diurnal or nocturnal.
花香的成分以及释放时间对于植物与其传粉者之间的化学通讯至关重要；因此，它们是表征传粉综合征的关键特征。然而，在许多植物中，植物是根据易于测量的花朵特征（如颜色、开花时间和形状）被归入某一传粉综合征的。我们比较了31种蝇子草属植物的白天和夜晚香气，并对先验分类为昼行性或夜行性的物种之间的香气进行了定量和半定量差异测试。由于大多数蝇子草属植物并不像其传粉综合征所预测的那样仅被昼行性或夜行性动物访花，我们推测，即使花香在白天或夜晚优先释放，大多数物种在一天中的相反时段也会释放一些香气。这种现象有助于解释在蝇子草属植物中通常观察到的广义访花者组合。我们发现，香气的昼夜变化往往与传粉综合征的定义不一致，但可以部分地用分类学和采样时间来解释。大多数物种在白天和夜晚都会释放对昆虫具有吸引潜力的化合物。我们的结果凸显了当前的一种观点，即传粉综合征并非为排除某些访花者而进化出的严格分类。因此，根据物种先验分类为昼行性或夜行性，在白天或夜间收集香气时，可能会丢失重要信息。
