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Carbon autonomy of reproductive shoots of Siberian alder (Alnus hirsuta var. sibirica)

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Abstract

Carbon autonomy of current-year shoots in flowering, and of current-year shoots plus 1-year-old shoots (1-year-old shoot system) in fruiting of Siberian alder (Alnus hirsuta var. sibirica) was investigated using a stable isotope of carbon, 13C. The current-year shoot and 1-year-old shoot systems were fed 13CO2 and the atom% excess of 13C in flowers and fruits was determined. The majority of photosynthate allocated to flower buds was originally assimilated in the leaves of the flowering current-year shoots. Of all the current-year shoots on fruiting 1-year-old shoots, only those nearest to the fruits allocated the assimilated photosynthate to fruit maturation. These results indicate that the current-year shoots and 1-year-old shoot systems are carbon-autonomous units for producing flowers and maturing fruits, respectively.

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Acknowledgements

We thank T. Ando, K. Kurumado, N. Miyamoto and all the staff of Takayama Research Station, Institute for Basin Ecosystem Studies, Gifu University for their support of field studies. We are grateful to Lake Biwa Museum, Shiga Prefecture for providing facilities for the stable isotope analysis. We are also grateful to H. Barclay and J. Henriksson for reading through the manuscript and giving us valuable suggestions, and to H. Nakajima, M. Hirobe, T. Shirota, M. Takagi, H. Kobayashi, Y. Miyazaki and the members of Laboratory of Forest Ecology, Graduate School of Agriculture, Kyoto University for their advice.

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Author notes

  1. Shigeaki Hasegawa

    Present address: Laboratory of Regional Ecosystems, Graduate School of Environmental Earth Science, Hokkaido University, Sapporo 060-0810, Japan

  2. Ichiro Tayasu

    Present address: Research Institute for Humanity and Nature, Kyoto, Japan

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Forest Ecology, Division of Environmental Science and Technology, Graduate School of Agriculture, Kyoto University, Kyoto , Japan

    Shigeaki Hasegawa, Ichiro Tayasu & Hiroshi Takeda

  2. Division of Biosphere Informatics, Graduate School of Informatics, Kyoto University, Japan

    Keisuke Koba

  3. Lake Biwa Museum, Kusatsu, Japan

    Hiroki Haga

Authors
  1. Shigeaki Hasegawa
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  2. Keisuke Koba
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  3. Ichiro Tayasu
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  4. Hiroshi Takeda
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  5. Hiroki Haga
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Correspondence to Shigeaki Hasegawa.

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Hasegawa, S., Koba, K., Tayasu, I. et al. Carbon autonomy of reproductive shoots of Siberian alder (Alnus hirsuta var. sibirica). J Plant Res 116, 183–188 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10265-003-0085-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10265-003-0085-7

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