Flowers may look simple from the outside, but inside, they can create their own miniature environments.
Flowers may look simple from the outside, but inside, they can create their own miniature environments. Research from Florida Atlantic University, published in New Phytologist, offers a new look at how the influence of petal color and light can shape the microscopic world inside a flower. The study shows that translucent “windows” in some flower petals can alter the light and heat entering a flower, changing its internal temperature, and influencing the microbes that live there.
“Flowers have microclimates, and just like the ecosystems we see around us every day, they have distinct temperatures and humidities,” said Jessica Williams, first author and an integrative biology doctoral student in the Department of Biological Sciences in FAU’s Charles E. Schmidt College of Science. “For the last 150 years we have studied how floral color impacts attractiveness to pollinators, but our work shows that this color can impact floral microbiomes via microclimatic shifts.”
The researchers studied two distant cousins of blueberries native to the southeastern United States, Lyonia lucida and Lyonia fruticosa, both of which are found throughout Florida. Their flowers have semi-translucent sections of their petals, as do many other members of the blueberry and heath family, Ericaceae.
Read more at: Florida Atlantic University
Jacob Francis, Ph.D., an assistant professor in FAU’s Department of Biological Sciences and lead principal investigator on the project. (Photo Credit: Florida Alantic University)
