Abstract. Mercury, Hg, is one of the most problematic metals from an environmental perspective. To assess problems caused by Hg in environment, it crucial to understand processes biogeochemistry, but exchange between atmosphere and vegetation not sufficiently well characterized. We explored mercury concentration, [Hg], foliage a diverse set plant types, locations sampling periods study whether ...

SUMMARY Understanding the processes underlying the transition from introduction to naturalization and spread is an important goal of invasion ecology. Release from pests and pathogens in association with capacity for rapid growth is thought to confer an advantage for species in novel regions.We assessed leaf herbivory and leaf-level traits associated with growth strategy in the native and exoti...

Despite limitations of low fertility and high acidity of the soils, the cerrado flora is the richest amongst savannas. Many cerrado woody species show sclerophyllous leaves, which might be related to the availability of water and nutrients in the soil. To better understand the function and structure of cerrado vegetation within its own variations, we compared two cerrado communities: one in its...

Leaf dark respiration (R) is one of the most fundamental physiological processes in plants and is a major component of terrestrial CO2 input to the atmosphere. Still, it is unclear how predictably species vary in R along broad climate gradients. Data for R and other key leaf traits were compiled for 208 woody species from 20 sites around the world. We quantified relationships between R and site...

Based on prior evidence of coordinated multiple leaf trait scaling, we hypothesized that variation among species in leaf dark respiration rate (Rd) should scale with variation in traits such as leaf nitrogen (N), leaf life-span, specific leaf area (SLA), and net photosynthetic capacity (A,,,). However, it is not known whether such scaling, if it exists, is similar among disparate biomes and pla...

Chloroplast development is an important subject in botany. In this study, a rice (Oryza sativa) mutant exhibiting impairment in early chloroplast development (seedling leaf albino (sla)) was isolated from a filial generation via hybridization breeding. The sla mutant seedlings have an aberrant form of chloroplasts, which resulted in albinism at the first and second leaves; however, the leaf she...

New plant trait measurements collected during the field sampling in Pannonian sandy grasslands Hungary and Serbia are presented. Selected traits include canopy height, leaf area (LA), specific (SLA) dry matter content (LDMC). The measurement procedures of overlapping, 3-dimensional or otherwise difficult-to-measure leaves shoots described details.

Pea plants, grown hydroponically, were supplied with different amounts of iron (Fe) ranging from complete deficiency to toxicity. Plant growth, chlorophyll and carotenoid content and chlorophyll fluorescence parameters were recorded at 7-day intervals from day 20 to day 41. Growth decrease, caused by Fe deficiency or excess as a rule accrued with strengthening and prolongation of the imposed st...

Plants distributed across a wide range of environmental conditions are submitted to differential selective pressures. Long-term selection can lead to the development of adaptations to the local environment, generating ecotypic differentiation. Additionally, plant species can cope with this environmental variability by phenotypic plasticity. In this study, we examine the importance of both proce...

1. Functional traits contribute to the success of invasive plants. These traits can reflect inherent properties or they can be new adaptations from evolutionary responses to escape from natural enemies of the introduced range. We tested the hypothesis that genetic shifts in morphological and physiological traits have occurred between native and invasive populations of Sapium sebiferum . 2. Sapi...