Local students from Boulder High School are supposed to do applied science projects – how fun! Finally, fellow Smith-lab postdoc Miranda Sinnott-Armstrong and I could team up to combine our interests in two incredibly important aspects of plant reproductive biology: fruits and flowers. Usually, flowers and pollination are studied independently of fruits and fruit dispersal, and both Miranda’s and my reserach makes no exception to this. Both processes are critical for the maintenance of genetic diversity within and among populations, however, and plants engage in a variety of interactions with animals to achieve that goal. With the help of Leah, we are now assembling a big dataset for both flower and fruit traits to link these two processes that have both been fundamental to the diversification of angiosperms.
A fun side project with high-school student Leah Maier
