A flower’s petal surface can act like a tiny diffraction grating, splitting light into iridescent colours that bees can see. The researcher will genetically alter the stiffness of two microscopic layers in *Hibiscus trionum* petals to test how these layers buckle into the nanoscale ridges that create this effect. Why this matters: Structural colour from diffraction gratings has been found in many flowering plants, but no one knows how these gratings form during development or whether they actually help attract pollinators in the wild. This project tackles both gaps by creating transgenic plants with altered gratings but unchanged other traits, then testing how bees respond to them. Potential impact: This is fundamental science. Understanding how a plant builds a nanoscale optical structure from simple mechanical forces could reveal principles of convergent evolution across hundreds of species. If the gratings prove ecologically important, it would reshape how biologists think about flower–pollinator signalling. Down the line, the same mechanical principles might inspire bioengineered surfaces for light manipulation—but that is not the aim here.
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The mutualistic relationship between pollinators and plants represents one of the most important interactions between animals and plants. Floral traits of plants play pivotal roles in this interaction by serving as signals for attraction of pollinators. Structural colour generated by diffraction gratings is one of the traits that have recently been discovered in diverse angiosperm species. Studies using artificial flowers have demonstrated that optical effects generated by floral diffraction gratings are salient to the model pollinator Bombus terrestris. However, how diffraction gratings are established during development of plants and whether this trait is ecologically important to plants by attracting pollinators in natural conditions remain to be investigated. To explore development of this trait, Hibiscus trionum has been established as a novel model plant and its floral diffraction gratings have been discovered as results of nanoridges in cuticles covering petal epidermal cells. It was further proposed that during development the cuticle proper undergoes isotropic expansion whereas the underlying extracellular matrix (ECM) expands anisotropically, so that in-plane compressive stress is induced to give rise to cuticular ridges. In this study, I will alter stiffness of the cuticle proper and ECM of H.trionum petal epidermal cells by genetically manipulating relevant genes to investigate how material properties of these two layers contribute to formation of diffraction gratings. The transgenic lines to be developed are expected to have altered diffraction gratings but keep other floral traits unchanged. These lines will be analysed for effects of the diffraction gratings on pollinator behaviour. Findings from this study will not only promote understanding of development and ecological importance of diffraction gratings in H.trionum, but also lay a foundation for investigation of the convergent evolution of this trait in diverse angiosperm species.
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