Candace Galen

Professor of Biological Sciences

PhD, 1983 University of Texas at Austin

galenc@missouri.edu
573-882-4832
217 Tucker Hall

FIG. 4. (A) Percentage of seedlings emerging, (B) percentage of established seedlings surviving to flowering, and (C) lifetime fitness in experimental seed plantings of four Arabidopsis thaliana genotypes. Bars show means and brackets give standard errors. Seedling emergence for each genotype is shown under open and shaded canopy levels to illustrate the significant genotype-by-canopy interaction (from Galen, Huddle, and Liscum (2004)).

Research description

Work in my laboratory uses experimental approaches to understand ecological and evolutionary responses of plants to the environment. In current research on the alpine skypilot, Polemonium viscosum, I am examining interaction webs involving host plants, pollinators and cheaters (nectar thieves). Ants acting as cheaters in the pollination mutualism between skypilots and bumblebees reduce seed production and pollen quality. Nonetheless, natural selection for bumblebees services remains strong across a wide range of ant densities. This system provides an ideal opportunity to test whether variation in cheater abundance accounts for the rarity of specialists in plant-pollinator mutualisms and to explore mechanisms of tolerance to cheaters and to floral antagonists, more broadly.

I am also interested in how climate affects biotic interaction webs. For skypilots, pollination quality declines under drought, suggesting that plant-pollinator mutualisms are sensitive to abiotic sources of environmental stress. The sensitivity of ecological relationships to climate may make plants that depend on animal partners for seed dispersal or pollination especially vulnerable to global change.

In other research I am exploring the role of physiological tradeoffs in the evolution of photoreceptors, focusing on phototropins, blue light photoreceptors in plants. In this collaboration with Mannie Liscum (MU) and Thomas Juenger (UT Austin) we are applying a cost benefit analysis to plastic responses under the control of phototropins. Research has revealed an important role for phototropins in mediating the tradeoff between carbon gain and water loss. Current experiments explore the genetic basis and fitness consequences for variation in phototropin-driven plasticity among natural populations of the genetic model, Arabidopsis thaliana.

Selected publications

Dona, A. J. and C. Galen. Nurse plant effects of willows (Salix) facilitate over-winter survival in alpine Chamerion angustifolium. Arct. Antarct., and Alp. Res 39:57-64.

Galen, C. and Geib, J. 2007. Density dependent effects of ants on selection for bumblebee pollination in Polemonium viscosum. Ecology 88: 1202-1209.

Galen, C. 2006. Solar furnaces or swamp coolers: costs and benefits of water use by solar-tracking flowers of the alpine snow buttercup, Ranunculus adoneus. Oecologia, DOI: 10.1007 / s00442-006-0362-Y.

Galen, C., Rabenold, J.J. and Liscum, E. 2006. The functional ecology of a blue light photoreceptor: effects of phototropin-1 on root growth enhance drought tolerance in Arabidopsis thaliana. New Phytologist 173: 91-99.

Galen, C. 2006. Solar furnaces or swamp coolers: costs and benefits of water use by solar-tracking flowers of the alpine snow buttercup, Ranunculus adoneus. Oecologia, DOI: 10.1007 / s00442-006-0362-Y.

Selected national/international awards and honors

Elected Fellow - AAAS

Modify