Abstract
A common hypothesis in plant science is that wild relatives of crops possess greater resilience to multiple stresses because they retain adaptive traits that have been diminished through domestication. Such reductions in resilience in cultivated crops are often attributed to trade-offs, whereby selection for agronomic performance decreases investment in stress tolerance. Alternatively, weakened multi-stress resilience may arise from relaxed natural selection in managed environments, where crops experience fewer ecological pressures. Vigna unguiculata, cowpea, is crucial for food security in arid and semi-arid regions due to its inherent stress tolerance, low input requirements, and nitrogen-fixing capacity. To test whether wild cowpea genotypes exhibit stronger multi-stress resilience than cultivated forms, we conducted a controlled full-factorial experiment using geographically and genetically diverse germplasm. Fourteen wild and cultivated genotypes spanning gradients in temperature, precipitation, and dry-season length were exposed to simulated drought and herbivory. We quantified growth responses and assessed trait variability using the coefficient of variation. Drought, herbivory, and their interaction significantly reduced productivity across all Vigna genotypes. However, wild types exhibited lower phenotypic variability and more consistent performance across stress treatments, suggesting that domestication may have reduced the stability of multi-stress responses. These findings improve our understanding of stress adaptation in cowpea and highlight the value of wild germplasm for breeding climate-resilient legumes.
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Claims 6
Claim · model-written summary
Drought reduced productivity across all Vigna genotypes.
- Taxon
- Cowpea
Vigna unguiculatat0 - Treatment
- Droughte1
- Outcome
- productivitye1
- Direction
- reducede1
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e1“Drought, herbivory, and their interaction significantly reduced productivity across all Vigna genotypes”
t0“Comparison of multi-stress resilience in wild and domesticated Cowpea”
Claim · model-written summary
Herbivory reduced productivity across all Vigna genotypes.
- Taxon
- CowpeaVigna unguiculatat0
- Treatment
- herbivorye1
- Outcome
- productivitye1
- Direction
- reducede1
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e1“Drought, herbivory, and their interaction significantly reduced productivity across all Vigna genotypes”
t0“Comparison of multi-stress resilience in wild and domesticated Cowpea”
Claim · model-written summary
The interaction of drought and herbivory reduced productivity across all Vigna genotypes.
- Taxon
- CowpeaVigna unguiculatat0
- Treatment
- their interactione1
- Outcome
- productivitye1
- Direction
- reducede1
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e1“Drought, herbivory, and their interaction significantly reduced productivity across all Vigna genotypes”
t0“Comparison of multi-stress resilience in wild and domesticated Cowpea”
Claim · model-written summary
Wild cowpea types showed lower phenotypic variability and more consistent performance across stress treatments.
- Taxon
- CowpeaVigna unguiculatat0
- Material
- wild typese2
- Outcome
- phenotypic variabilitye2
- Direction
- lowere2
- Qualifier
- more consistent performance across stress treatmentse2
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e2“wild types exhibited lower phenotypic variability and more consistent performance across stress treatments”
t0“Comparison of multi-stress resilience in wild and domesticated Cowpea”
Claim · model-written summary
Domestication may have reduced the stability of multi-stress responses.
- Taxon
- CowpeaVigna unguiculatat0
- Outcome
- stability of multi-stress responsese3
- Qualifier
- domesticatione3
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e3“suggesting that domestication may have reduced the stability of multi-stress responses”
t0“Comparison of multi-stress resilience in wild and domesticated Cowpea”
Claim · model-written summary
The authors recommend using wild germplasm for breeding climate-resilient legumes.
- Taxon
- CowpeaVigna unguiculatat0
- Outcome
- wild germplasm for breeding climate-resilient legumese4
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e4“highlight the value of wild germplasm for breeding climate-resilient legumes”
t0“Comparison of multi-stress resilience in wild and domesticated Cowpea”
The same questions in other papers
drought · yield · Vigna unguiculata (cowpea)Results differ
38 papers in the same direction as this paper · 7 in the opposite direction
- positive
- positive
- positive
42 papers more in this group
See all 46 papers →grazing · yield · Vigna unguiculata (cowpea)Positive and negative results
1 in the opposite direction
- positive
Claims are grouped by organism, treatment and what was measured or targeted. A paper counts as positive when any of its claims in the group is positive.