🍩 Database of Original & Non-Theoretical Uses of Topology

(found 3 matches in 0.001236s)

  1. Morphometrics Reveals Complex and Heritable Apple Leaf Shapes (2018)

    Zoë Migicovsky, Mao Li, Daniel H. Chitwood, Sean Myles
    Abstract Apple (Malus spp.) is a widely grown and valuable fruit crop. Leaf shape is important for flowering in apple and may also be an early indicator for other agriculturally valuable traits. We examined 9,000 leaves from 869 unique apple accessions using linear measurements and comprehensive morphometric techniques. We identified allometric variation as the result of differing length-to-width aspect ratios between accessions and species of apple. The allometric variation was due to variation in the width of the leaf blade, not the length. Aspect ratio was highly correlated with the first principal component (PC1) of morphometric variation quantified using elliptical Fourier descriptors (EFDs) and persistent homology (PH). While the primary source of variation was aspect ratio, subsequent PCs corresponded to complex shape variation not captured by linear measurements. After linking the morphometric information with over 122,000 genome-wide single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), we found high SNP heritability values even at later PCs, indicating that comprehensive morphometrics can capture complex, heritable phenotypes. Thus, techniques such as EFDs and PH are capturing heritable biological variation that would be missed using linear measurements alone.

  2. Rootstock Effects on Scion Phenotypes in a ‘Chambourcin’ Experimental Vineyard (2019)

    Zoë Migicovsky, Zachary N Harris, Laura L Klein, Mao Li, Adam McDermaid, Daniel H Chitwood, Anne Fennell, Laszlo G Kovacs, Misha Kwasniewski, Jason P Londo, Qin Ma, Allison J Miller
    Abstract Understanding how root systems modulate shoot system phenotypes is a fundamental question in plant biology and will be useful in developing resilient agricultural crops. Grafting is a common horticultural practice that joins the roots (rootstock) of one plant to the shoot (scion) of another, providing an excellent method for investigating how these two organ systems affect each other. In this study, we used the French-American hybrid grapevine ‘Chambourcin’ (Vitis L.) as a model to explore the rootstock–scion relationship. We examined leaf shape, ion concentrations, and gene expression in ‘Chambourcin’ grown ungrafted as well as grafted to three different rootstocks (‘SO4’, ‘1103P’ and ‘3309C’) across 2 years and three different irrigation treatments. We found that a significant amount of the variation in leaf shape could be explained by the interaction between rootstock and irrigation. For ion concentrations, the primary source of variation identified was the position of a leaf in a shoot, although rootstock and rootstock by irrigation interaction also explained a significant amount of variation for most ions. Lastly, we found rootstock-specific patterns of gene expression in grafted plants when compared to ungrafted vines. Thus, our work reveals the subtle and complex effect of grafting on ‘Chambourcin’ leaf morphology, ionomics, and gene expression.

  3. Topological Data Analysis as a Morphometric Method: Using Persistent Homology to Demarcate a Leaf Morphospace (2018)

    Mao Li, Hong An, Ruthie Angelovici, Clement Bagaza, Albert Batushansky, Lynn Clark, Viktoriya Coneva, Michael J. Donoghue, Erika Edwards, Diego Fajardo, Hui Fang, Margaret H. Frank, Timothy Gallaher, Sarah Gebken, Theresa Hill, Shelley Jansky, Baljinder Kaur, Phillip C. Klahs, Laura L. Klein, Vasu Kuraparthy, Jason Londo, Zoë Migicovsky, Allison Miller, Rebekah Mohn, Sean Myles, Wagner C. Otoni, J. C. Pires, Edmond Rieffer, Sam Schmerler, Elizabeth Spriggs, Christopher N. Topp, Allen Van Deynze, Kuang Zhang, Linglong Zhu, Braden M. Zink, Daniel H. Chitwood
    Abstract Current morphometric methods that comprehensively measure shape cannot compare the disparate leaf shapes found in seed plants and are sensitive to processing artifacts. We explore the use of persistent homology, a topological method applied as a filtration across simplicial complexes (or more simply, a method to measure topological features of spaces across different spatial resolutions), to overcome these limitations. The described method isolates subsets of shape features and measures the spatial relationship of neighboring pixel densities in a shape. We apply the method to the analysis of 182,707 leaves, both published and unpublished, representing 141 plant families collected from 75 sites throughout the world. By measuring leaves from throughout the seed plants using persistent homology, a defined morphospace comparing all leaves is demarcated. Clear differences in shape between major phylogenetic groups are detected and estimates of leaf shape diversity within plant families are made. The approach predicts plant family above chance. The application of a persistent homology method, using topological features, to measure leaf shape allows for a unified morphometric framework to measure plant form, including shapes, textures, patterns, and branching architectures.