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UNIVERSITE DE BOURGOGNE THÈSE Yongbo LIU - Université de ...

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ARTICLE 1<br />

The effect of seed size on plant fitness with implication for transgene flow<br />

between oilseed rape (Brassica napus) and wild brown mustard (Brassica<br />

juncea)<br />

<strong>Yongbo</strong> <strong>LIU</strong>, Zhixi TANG, Henri DARMENCY, C. Neal STEWART, Jr., Wei WEI, Keping<br />

MA<br />

Abstract<br />

Recent work has advanced the h ypothesis that gene flow could b e hampered b y small seed<br />

size of hybrids formed between crop cultivars and their wild relatives as small seeds may be<br />

disadvantaged in their early establishment to plants in nature. Herein we report plant fitness of<br />

three seed-size categories in hybrids formed between transgenic oilseed rape (Brassica napus)<br />

and w ild B. j uncea as well as i n t heir p arents, P lant d ensity is co nsi<strong>de</strong>red as an i mportant<br />

factor. Plant <strong>de</strong>nsity and seed size significantly affected plant growth and reproduction. The<br />

influence of seed size on plant fitness varied among genetic backgrounds and was affected by<br />

plant <strong>de</strong>nsity and competing neighbors. Small-see<strong>de</strong>d transgenic oilseed rape plants had lower<br />

fitness than larger-see<strong>de</strong>d plants. Plants from small-sized seeds had <strong>de</strong>layed flowering but did<br />

not ha ve di fferent bi omass a nd s eed out put i n non-transgenic F 1 and wild B. j uncea, and<br />

small-see<strong>de</strong>d plants had the same fitness as large-see<strong>de</strong>d ones in transgenic F1. These results<br />

imply that further gene flow could not be reduced by the production of small-sized seeds in<br />

transgenic hybrids in field. In<strong>de</strong>ed, consi<strong>de</strong>ring competition factors and also that small seeds<br />

can persist in soil and/or disperse more easily compared to larger seeds, biosafety and gene<br />

flow could actually be more problematic in small-see<strong>de</strong>d transgenic hybrids.<br />

Key words: commercial release, competition, gene flow, plant <strong>de</strong>nsity, seed size, transgenic<br />

crops<br />

36

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