Eighteen morphological traits of functional importance for interactions between workers and the environment were measured to characterize the size and shape of the workers.
Removal of Rfx6 perturbs key molecular traits of functional β cells with the reduction in expression of glucokinase, the ATP-sensitive K+ channel Abcc8/SUR1, as well as eight voltage-gated Ca2+ channel genes, some of which are direct targets of Rfx6.
The article by Moyle and Muir (2010) provides a fascinating overview of research on tomato and its wild relatives, in particular highlighting how such studies can provide insight into the mechanisms underlying traits of functional importance (e.g. adaptation to water stress).
A chi-square test statistic for each SNP marker showing linkage within a QTL interval was obtained using 2 × 3 contingency tables to demonstrate the distribution of parental strain alleles within the F2 population using the quantitative traits of functional motor deficits, CNS vascular permeability, and astrocyte activation.
Several recent reports have documented the diverse trait association potential of functional marker loci developed from different coding and UTR sequence components of a gene like starch biosynthesis and grain size (GS3 and GS5) genes in rice.
In contrast to measuring specific traits, other measures of functional diversity use multivariate techniques to evaluate trait differences/similarities among species without reliance on a small number of traits selected a priori.
We quantified community and functional responses of a temperate forest lizard community to fire and rotational logging using metrics including species-specific abundance, community abundance, species richness and evenness, as well as trait-based measures of functional diversity.
For this purpose, the trait-based approach has promoted the analysis of functional trait distributions within communities.
When coevolving traits do not affect other functions, coevolution and evolution of functional traits may be orthogonal and proceed independently.
Yet important aspects of wood functional traits—hypothesized to covary along a 'wood economics spectrum' (WES; Chave et al. 2009)—still remain poorly understood when compared with other notable suites of functional traits such as leaf traits, reproductive traits or tree size metrics (reviewed by Westoby et al. 2002).
