BLOOMINGTON, Ind., March 22 (UPI) -- Indiana University-Bloomington scientists say the theory that plants cannot be divided into species the same way as animals are identified is wrong.
The IU scientists say their analysis of 882 plant and animal species and 1,347 inter-species crossings -- the first large-scale comparison of species barriers in plants and animals -- showed plant species are just as easily categorized as animal species.
The study also yielded a surprise: The hybrid offspring of different animal species are more likely to be fertile than the hybrid offspring of plant species.
"Not only are plants just as easily subdivided into species as animals when analyzed statistically, plants are more likely to be reproductively isolated due to hybrid sterility," said Evolutionary Biologist Loren Rieseberg, who led the study. "Most plant species are indeed 'real.' The problem has been that botanists have been way over-attracted to the plant species that readily hybridize and where the hybrids perpetuate themselves asexually."
Rieseberg and his co-authors -- doctoral student Troy Wood and postdoctoral research associate Eric Baack -- report their research in this week's issue of the journal Nature.
