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Environmental Genomics
Origins of biodiversity
Genes that allow metals to accumulate in plants
Plants can sometimes accumulate hundreds of times more metal in their leaves than is normal - a phenomenon known as hyperaccumulation.
It is not known exactly why plants accumulate metals, but one possibility is that it protects them from pests and diseases. It could also be that the plants accumulate the metal whilst taking up other nutrients.
Physiological and genomic studies have identified a number of candidate genes, but analysis showed that most of these are not responsible for the adaptation since they are not Quantitative Trait Loci.