Naked Science Forum

Life Sciences => Plant Sciences, Zoology & Evolution => Topic started by: harvester on 06/02/2008 11:01:11

Title: Seed Predisposition
Post by: harvester on 06/02/2008 11:01:11

I have searched long and hard for an answer to this question, a free answer obviously.. :wink:

Is it possible that a plant can completely reverse sex while in the vegetation stage (or indeed any stage)? Obviously all flowering plants are or have an immense capacity for hermaphroditism... but could it be that neither chromosome is more dominant until the environment determines it whilst the plants are in veg' stage?

Title: Seed Predisposition
Post by: harvester on 07/02/2008 10:09:54

Ok, maybe I didn't explain the question properly...

Recently (couple of years ago) a certain company published information on artificially feminised seed, and how the environment could play a part in re-reversing a percentage of the artificially feminised seed.

Unfortunately this information was misinterpreted and people took it as a generalisation of seeds. In other words they started to believe that the environment could completely reverse the sex of a normal plant.

Are there any examples of any plants being able to do a full sex reversal depending on the environment?