Predicting Plant Phenolics

Clive G. Jones
Institute of Ecosystem Studies

Phenolics are found in all terrestrial higher plants, varying markedly in concentration. These compounds serve many functions: support, sunscreens, free radical scavenging, wound sealing, defense against consumer attack, regulation of decomposition, and allelopathy. Because phenolics play so many key ecological roles, we need to be able to predict how concentrations will change in response to the diversity of changing environmental factors associated with human-accelerated environmental change. Empirical work on phenolics in a number of species has led to the development of a new Protein Competition Model for predicting plant phenolic concentrations. The model is based on the recognition that phenolic biosynthesis and protein synthesis both compete for the same limited resource, the amino acid phenylalanine. The model predicts phenolic allocation in plants in response to a diversity of both single and multiple sources of abiotic and biotic stress and damage, including factors associated with global change, such as elevated CO₂, temperature, nitrogen enrichment, altered precipitation and enhanced UV_B radiation.

Collaborator
Susan Hartley, Institute of Terrestrial Ecology, Banchory, UK

Publications

• Jones, C. G. and Hartley, S. E. 199x. A protein competition model of phenolic allocation. Oikos (in press).
  
• Jones, C. G. and Hartley, S. E. 1998. Global change and plant phenolic concentrations: species level predictions using the Protein Competition Model. pp.23-50 In: De Kok, L. J., and Stulen, I. (eds.). Responses of Plant Metabolism to Air Pollution and Global Change. Backhuys Publishers, Leiden, The Netherlands.

More on Plant Chemical Variation
Hartley, S. E. and Jones, C. G. 1997. Plant chemistry and herbivory, or why the world is green. pp.284-324. In: Crawley, M. J. (ed.). Plant Ecology, 2nd edition. Blackwell Science Ltd., Oxford, UK.