Study on Variation and Covariation Pattern of Seedling Nutrient Concentrations within and between Populations of Arabidopsis pumila

Patterns of within and between populations variation in concentrations of nutrients(N,P,K,Na,Ca,Mg,Fe,Cu,Mn,Zn)are reported in mature individual seedling of Arabidopsis pumila,the phylogenetic neighbourhood of A. thaliana from six populations in Mahe drainage basin Xingjiang Autonomous Region. Results show that difference of ten element concentrations of between-population is significant. There are various difference traits within and between populations in concentrations of nutrients because A. pumila has strong phenotypic plasticity to respond to the stress of a vary of habitants and local water,light and salina in soil,concentrations of Na,Ca,Mg,Fe,Zn show similar variation pattern within and between populations,which are key changeable elements to respond to heterogeneous environment for A. pumila. Differences of N,P,K,Cu,Mn concentration are stable relatively within population. The power for detec-ting significant correlations within population is limited,merely attain 3-6 pairs. The positive correlation between Na and Zn,K and Ca,K and Na concentrations consistently occur in all po-pulations,and K and Ca is significant correlation in five populations.Principle component analysis discovers the number of explanatory PCs are all compose of three loadings,account for supplementary 83.9%-91.4%. K,Ca and Na consistently indicate the positive correlation with PCs in five populations. From these results,it is inferred that this integration pattern may be main reason that A.pumila is abundance in Xinjiang area which is salina and drought. However,common principal component analysis indicates that nutrient covariance matrices were unrelated among populations,this multivariate pattern isn’t regarded as common integration characters of A. pumila in all populations until research in larger scale.