Phylogenetic variation in heavy metal accumulation in angiosperms

The influence of phylogeny on shoot heavy metal content in plants was inves tigated and the hypothesis tested that traits impacting on the accumulation of cadmium, chromium, copper, nickel, lead and zinc in plant shoots are as sociated. Data suitable for comparative analyses were generated from a literature sur vey, using a residual maximum likelihood (REML) procedure. Both pair-wise r egressions and principal components analyses (PCA) were performed on indepe ndent contrasts of shoot metal content. Significant variation in shoot metal content occurred at the classification level of order and above, suggesting an ancient evolution of traits. Trait s impacting on the accumulation of metals in plant shoots were associated. This information can be used to improve predictions of soil-to-plant metal transfer, to formulate hypotheses on the origins of metal-accumulating phen otypes and to inform the exploitation of plant genetic resources for nutrit ional improvement and phytoremediation.