Phylogenetic relatedness mediates persistence and density of soil seed banks

Soil seed banks can strongly affect survival and expansion of plant populations by spreading mortality risks and distributing genetic diversity through time. Knowledge of the main factors regulating the ability of seeds to persist in the soil beyond the first growing season is however limited. While morphological and physiological seed traits, and the degree of environmental uncertainty are considered important in shaping the seed-banking strategies of plants, global assessments that explicitly account for phylogenetic relatedness are lacking.

Using a global seed bank database comprising data for 2350 angiosperms, we examined the extent to which two seed bank properties, i.e., seed bank type (transient vs. persistent) and density of viable seed banks, are determined by phylogenetic relatedness. We then tested phylogenetic correlations between these properties with seed mass and seed dormancy (dormant vs. non-dormant), and the contribution of phylogenetic relatedness relative to that...