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Fragmentary Blue: Resolving the Rarity Paradox in Flower Colors
Blue is a favored color of many humans. While blue skies and oceans are a common visual experience, this color is less frequently observed in flowers. We first review how blue has been important in human culture, and thus how our perception of blue has likely influenced the way of scientifically eva...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Frontiers Media S.A.
2021
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7859648/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33552110 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpls.2020.618203 |
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author | Dyer, Adrian G. Jentsch, Anke Burd, Martin Garcia, Jair E. Giejsztowt, Justyna Camargo, Maria G. G. Tjørve, Even Tjørve, Kathleen M. C. White, Peter Shrestha, Mani |
author_facet | Dyer, Adrian G. Jentsch, Anke Burd, Martin Garcia, Jair E. Giejsztowt, Justyna Camargo, Maria G. G. Tjørve, Even Tjørve, Kathleen M. C. White, Peter Shrestha, Mani |
author_sort | Dyer, Adrian G. |
collection | PubMed |
description | Blue is a favored color of many humans. While blue skies and oceans are a common visual experience, this color is less frequently observed in flowers. We first review how blue has been important in human culture, and thus how our perception of blue has likely influenced the way of scientifically evaluating signals produced in nature, including approaches as disparate as Goethe’s Farbenlehre, Linneaus’ plant taxonomy, and current studies of plant-pollinator networks. We discuss the fact that most animals, however, have different vision to humans; for example, bee pollinators have trichromatic vision based on UV-, Blue-, and Green-sensitive photoreceptors with innate preferences for predominantly short-wavelength reflecting colors, including what we perceive as blue. The subsequent evolution of blue flowers may be driven by increased competition for pollinators, both because of a harsher environment (as at high altitude) or from high diversity and density of flowering plants (as in nutrient-rich meadows). The adaptive value of blue flowers should also be reinforced by nutrient richness or other factors, abiotic and biotic, that may reduce extra costs of blue-pigments synthesis. We thus provide new perspectives emphasizing that, while humans view blue as a less frequently evolved color in nature, to understand signaling, it is essential to employ models of biologically relevant observers. By doing so, we conclude that short wavelength reflecting blue flowers are indeed frequent in nature when considering the color vision and preferences of bees. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7859648 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2021 |
publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-78596482021-02-05 Fragmentary Blue: Resolving the Rarity Paradox in Flower Colors Dyer, Adrian G. Jentsch, Anke Burd, Martin Garcia, Jair E. Giejsztowt, Justyna Camargo, Maria G. G. Tjørve, Even Tjørve, Kathleen M. C. White, Peter Shrestha, Mani Front Plant Sci Plant Science Blue is a favored color of many humans. While blue skies and oceans are a common visual experience, this color is less frequently observed in flowers. We first review how blue has been important in human culture, and thus how our perception of blue has likely influenced the way of scientifically evaluating signals produced in nature, including approaches as disparate as Goethe’s Farbenlehre, Linneaus’ plant taxonomy, and current studies of plant-pollinator networks. We discuss the fact that most animals, however, have different vision to humans; for example, bee pollinators have trichromatic vision based on UV-, Blue-, and Green-sensitive photoreceptors with innate preferences for predominantly short-wavelength reflecting colors, including what we perceive as blue. The subsequent evolution of blue flowers may be driven by increased competition for pollinators, both because of a harsher environment (as at high altitude) or from high diversity and density of flowering plants (as in nutrient-rich meadows). The adaptive value of blue flowers should also be reinforced by nutrient richness or other factors, abiotic and biotic, that may reduce extra costs of blue-pigments synthesis. We thus provide new perspectives emphasizing that, while humans view blue as a less frequently evolved color in nature, to understand signaling, it is essential to employ models of biologically relevant observers. By doing so, we conclude that short wavelength reflecting blue flowers are indeed frequent in nature when considering the color vision and preferences of bees. Frontiers Media S.A. 2021-01-15 /pmc/articles/PMC7859648/ /pubmed/33552110 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpls.2020.618203 Text en Copyright © 2021 Dyer, Jentsch, Burd, Garcia, Giejsztowt, Camargo, Tjørve, Tjørve, White and Shrestha. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. |
spellingShingle | Plant Science Dyer, Adrian G. Jentsch, Anke Burd, Martin Garcia, Jair E. Giejsztowt, Justyna Camargo, Maria G. G. Tjørve, Even Tjørve, Kathleen M. C. White, Peter Shrestha, Mani Fragmentary Blue: Resolving the Rarity Paradox in Flower Colors |
title | Fragmentary Blue: Resolving the Rarity Paradox in Flower Colors |
title_full | Fragmentary Blue: Resolving the Rarity Paradox in Flower Colors |
title_fullStr | Fragmentary Blue: Resolving the Rarity Paradox in Flower Colors |
title_full_unstemmed | Fragmentary Blue: Resolving the Rarity Paradox in Flower Colors |
title_short | Fragmentary Blue: Resolving the Rarity Paradox in Flower Colors |
title_sort | fragmentary blue: resolving the rarity paradox in flower colors |
topic | Plant Science |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7859648/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33552110 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpls.2020.618203 |
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