title: A quantitative framework for flower phenotyping in cultivated carnation (Dianthus caryophyllus L.).
abstract: Most important breeding goals in ornamental crops are plant appearance and flower characteristics where selection is visually performed on direct offspring of crossings. We developed an image analysis toolbox for the acquisition of flower and petal images from cultivated carnation (Dianthus caryophyllus L.) that was validated by a detailed analysis of flower and petal size and shape in 78 commercial cultivars of D. caryophyllus, including 55 standard, 22 spray and 1 pot carnation cultivars. Correlation analyses allowed us to reduce the number of parameters accounting for the observed variation in flower and petal morphology. Convexity was used as a descriptor for the level of serration in flowers and petals. We used a landmark-based approach that allowed us to identify eight main principal components (PCs) accounting for most of the variance observed in petal shape. The effect and the strength of these PCs in standard and spray carnation cultivars are consistent with shared underlying mechanisms involved in the morphological diversification of petals in both subpopulations. Our results also indicate that neighbor-joining trees built with morphological data might infer certain phylogenetic relationships among carnation cultivars. Based on estimated broad-sense heritability values for some flower and petal features, different genetic determinants shall modulate the responses of flower and petal morphology to environmental cues in this species. We believe our image analysis toolbox could allow capturing flower variation in other species of high ornamental value.
authors.affiliation: Instituto de Bioingeniería, Universidad Miguel Hernández, Elche, Spain.
authors.forename: Borja
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Chacón
authors.affiliation: Instituto de Bioingeniería, Universidad Miguel Hernández, Elche, Spain.
authors.forename: Roberto
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Ballester
authors.affiliation: Instituto de Bioingeniería, Universidad Miguel Hernández, Elche, Spain.
authors.forename: Virginia
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Birlanga
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.
authors.forename: Anne-Gaëlle
authors.initials: AG
authors.lastname: Rolland-Lagan
authors.affiliation: Instituto de Bioingeniería, Universidad Miguel Hernández, Elche, Spain.
authors.forename: José Manuel
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Pérez-Pérez
mesh_terms: D029749:Dianthus / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000254:growth & development*; D004777:Environment; D035264:Flowers / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000254:growth & development*; D040582:Inheritance Patterns / Q000235:genetics; D009929:Organ Size; D010641:Phenotype; D025341:Principal Component Analysis